Refusing to pay customs

[Kerryd]

From FedEx website:
7% VAT to be imposed on imported goods with a value lower than THB1,500 | Posted on July 2, 2024

Effective from July 5 to December 31, 2024, the Ministry of Finance will impose a 7% VAT on imported goods valued less than THB1,500. As a result, goods purchased from abroad will be subject to the same VAT as goods purchased from local Thai stores.

FedEx would like to inform our customers that we will collect 7% VAT on imported goods with a value lower than THB1,500 to submit to Customs Department. Customers can learn more about this VAT through the Thai Customs website or their hotline at 1164. 

Continue to check this page for service updates. For further enquiries, please contact your Sales Representative or our Customer Service team.

[Kerryd]

From FedEx website:
 

Can I refuse to accept an international package?
 

As a customer you have the right not to accept an international package if, for example, it was damaged, you cancelled your order or you changed your mind.

If you refuse to accept an international package, the FedEx driver may ask you for a signed confirmation of your refusal. The driver will then take the package back to the delivery depot. We will contact your shipper to inform them of your decision and ask them whether the shipment needs to be returned or destroyed.
 

Keep in mind that you might still need to pay duties and taxes for importing a package. You can try to claim a refund on these duties and taxes directly with customs.

[Kerryd]

From UPS website:

Special Handling of Undeliverable Packages

Shipments refused by the consignee, or which for any other reason cannot be delivered, will be held, and UPS will attempt to contact the shipper for further instructions. The shipper will be responsible for payment of all charges, including, but not limited to, forwarding, disposal, or return transportation charges, as well as any duty and tax, if applicable

[Kerryd]

From DHL:
 

A Shipment is considered as undeliverable if (i) the Recipient's address is incomplete, illegible, incorrect or cannot be located, (ii) the Shipment is unable to clear Customs, (iii) the Shipment has not been released by customs due to non-payment of duty and taxes (iv) the Shipment contains prohibited items (v) shipment is refused by the consignee before opening the package.

All undeliverable Shipments will be returned to the DHL eCommerce facility for customer identification and return service preference.
Shipper may be liable for any and all charges and fees incurred in returning, storing or disposing of an undeliverable shipment unless the undeliverable shipment was due to the fault of DHL eCommerce.

[george]

25 minutes ago, Kerryd said:

For "non-food" items, it's best to use Amazon. Especially now that they will estimate the Duties and charge you for them at the time of purchase.

I've never had a problem with an Amazon package being delivered (via Amazon) and never been told I had to pay more than their estimate.

In fact, I've often received (small) refunds when it turns out the Duties were less than their estimation.

I stopped ordering from eBay and a couple other places because everything they ship seems to go by FedEx or UPS.

I've had similar issues in the past with DHL shipments and UPS shipments. They all say the same thing - send us your passport and we'll clear the shipment for you in 2-3 days.
But they won't explain how they can clear the shipment without me - if I send them my passport - but can't do it with signed photocopies.

And then tell me I can go to a Customs office and "register" and send them a scan of the little paper card and that's good enough.

I shipped some personal belongs home from Afghanistan when our contract ended. The company was paying for shipping so I decided to use that rather than carry a couple heavy suitcases through a couple airports.

1 large and 1 small box. Small box arrived no problem.
3 days later DHL tells me the big box is stuck in Customs and I have to send my passport and pay 22,000 baht to clear it.

I had a friend drive me to Suvarnabhumi and went to the DHL "Customs Office". I argued that the box was just old clothes, bed linens, some books, work boots, coffee cups and so on. Basically the contents of my room on the camp that I didn't want to throw away.

After a lengthy one-sided conversation, a clerk told me I could use a "private" broker to help me for just 17,000 baht.

So I did that. Went to 3 different offices with different forms (and 100 baht notes) to get stamped and then to the DHL storage place inside the Free Trade Zone where they told me I had to get the other box because the shipment said "2" boxes ! The box they'd already delivered to Pattaya and I had unpacked days earlier !!

The ****ers wanted me to go back, repack the box with the stuff that had been in it, bring it to the Free Zone and somehow get it inside - so we could then go to a Customs agent to verify that yes, I had two boxes.

The DHL manager (British guy) came along and after a brief chat admitted they'd screwed up by delivering the first box before the 2nd had cleared Customs.

They then took a shipping envelope, stuffed some bubble wrap inside, wrote on a label and stuck that on the envelope and Bingo  ! I had my "second" package.

Went to Customs, a clerk came out, lifted the lid of the big box, looked at my declaration, initialed and stamped the form and that was it.

The ACTUAL Customs duties and taxes came out to about 1,100 baht !!!
DHL was going to charge me 22,000 baht !!!

 

 

Thanks for sharing.

 

DHL is in it together with customs. Percent based.

[new2here]

12 hours ago, dinga said:

The consistent message is NEVER send goods to Thailand via courier - as assessment of customs duties & taxes is pretty well guaranteed, as well as frustrating clearance processes.

 

Use EMS Post

This is true… and there is a reason for this.. PRIVATE carriers like the FedExs and UPS’ of the world MUST pre-notify inbound customs of what’s coming.. regardless of what it is.. they break up shipments into “doc”’or document and “non-doc” shipments … generally doc shipments (commonly letters etc ) can move with no paperwork and clear with minimal fuss and inspection and no fees/duties.. for NON-doc things it can really vary based on the import country, what it is, their tariff schedule etc … Back in the day UPS actually sent a scanned image of actual paper attached to all non-doc shipments electrically from the center where the package was picked up by UPS- so either Louisville, Ontario, Miami or whichever gateway was used could see the docs were in good order AND they were sent onward to the UPS brokerage office at the destination.. and the brokerage arm would work with customs to determine what will pass without inspection, what is dutiable.. that way when the packages actually arrives in country, most of what will happen to what packages is largely known…

 

 that’s where the fee comes from.. the brokerage ….  With public post, for most non-commercial shipments of small value, there is no formal importation process - thus no need for a brokerage per se.. and if needed it’s included - up to a certain limit…  now, if you send a high value shipment commercially, yes, the destination country could deem that a dutiable shipment and may also require a formal entry process - whereby a brokerage would become involved.

 

So.. it’s not so much UPS’ or FedExs fault per se, but more a reflection of the process differences between public post mail and private express couriers.. 

 

 

[Aforek]

4 hours ago, digger70 said:

Me same , But Can't use the account without the  Thai  13 digit  ID or Business account We as foreigners Can't get  the 13digit ID that's Required I've tried even with showing the Yellow book that has a 13 digit Number    Even the Covid register number is 13 digits .

You should try again as before, it seems to work

I have just ( but not use it yet ) changed my visa card number and they told me that I can use my new card to buy some goods 

[Liverpool Lou]

On 7/26/2024 at 8:04 PM, Celsius said:

 

Forget the duties.....Fedex will kill you on their brokerage fees.... the service you pay them to clear the customa for you.

Nonsense, their fee probably would be more than a couple of hundred baht.

[Liverpool Lou]

9 hours ago, ryxyz said:

About 7 years ago I ordered a Chromebook on Amazon and when it arrived I was asked to pay 2,000 by the FedEx delivery man and I refused to pay because I'd already paid the custom fee to Amazon. After I called Amazon to complain, my Chromebook was promptly delivered a few hours later.

Laptop-type computers are zero-rated for import duty so Amazon shouldn't have charged you for it, either.

[Liverpool Lou]

8 hours ago, dick turpin said:

Had a shipment sent via DHL, after it arrived they

sent me an email saying it would only be delivered

after I paid them customs and VAT charges

That is perfectly normal, what's your point?  Import goods into Thailand, don't be surprised if you're charged import duty and VAT

[stoner]

1 hour ago, new2here said:

for NON-doc things it can really vary based on the import country, what it is, their tariff schedule etc

 

value is the first assessment for a shipment. those other things come after. 

[Celsius]

47 minutes ago, Liverpool Lou said:

Nonsense, their fee probably would be more than a couple of hundred baht.

 

As usual, you always pretend like you know what you are talking about 

[dinga]

11 hours ago, new2here said:

This is true… and there is a reason for this.. PRIVATE carriers like the FedExs and UPS’ of the world MUST pre-notify inbound customs of what’s coming.. regardless of what it is.. they break up shipments into “doc”’or document and “non-doc” shipments … generally doc shipments (commonly letters etc ) can move with no paperwork and clear with minimal fuss and inspection and no fees/duties.. for NON-doc things it can really vary based on the import country, what it is, their tariff schedule etc … Back in the day UPS actually sent a scanned image of actual paper attached to all non-doc shipments electrically from the center where the package was picked up by UPS- so either Louisville, Ontario, Miami or whichever gateway was used could see the docs were in good order AND they were sent onward to the UPS brokerage office at the destination.. and the brokerage arm would work with customs to determine what will pass without inspection, what is dutiable.. that way when the packages actually arrives in country, most of what will happen to what packages is largely known…

 

 that’s where the fee comes from.. the brokerage ….  With public post, for most non-commercial shipments of small value, there is no formal importation process - thus no need for a brokerage per se.. and if needed it’s included - up to a certain limit…  now, if you send a high value shipment commercially, yes, the destination country could deem that a dutiable shipment and may also require a formal entry process - whereby a brokerage would become involved.

 

So.. it’s not so much UPS’ or FedExs fault per se, but more a reflection of the process differences between public post mail and private express couriers.. 

 

 

 

Perhaps - however I would strongly urge anyone who is assessed significant import duty on a courier consignment to closely check the HS Classification Code that the Company/Customs has used to determine the duty rate.  Personal experience with a glaringly incorrect HS Code (and the resulting wrong 30% import duty rate which was properly 0%) took a frustrating long time to overturn  -  making me very suspicious of processes and motives. 

[frank83628]

i tend to avoid the big carriers as they always get customs charges due to most items being 'new', nothing will happen if you refuse to pay, but you lose the item, might get sent back after a certain amount of time.

 

[Skeptic7]

On 7/26/2024 at 7:40 PM, Pouatchee said:

 

sorry for sidetracking your topic here,,, since paypal has been out of commission for foreigners i havent been able to buy anything on paypal. can i ask you, how do you pay? credit card? thai bank account?

let me know... thx

I bought an item on eBay (USA) recently. No PayPal required. Have for many years just used my US credit cards. Shipping cost more than the item, but it was something special that couldn't be found elsewhere. Item $22usd + shipping $25usd. No customs duty charged. Took 5 weeks to be delivered here...on a slow boat from Chinatown apparently. 🤣

[GammaGlobulin]

On 7/27/2024 at 7:49 AM, digbeth said:

Fedex send it back to the seller who can refund you

 

Yes.

This is what I chose to do.

The import tax was out of sight.

I will not pay money for nothing.

 

Money for Nothing?

Kicks for Free?

 

 

[simon43]

If you refuse to pay the import tax, the item will not be returned to the sender - it will be destroyed.  This happened to me a few weeks ago when a friend in the UK sent me a free GPS antenna (no payment from me). Unfortunately, he sent it by courier >> big mistake! I asked the courier to return it to the sender, but from previous experiences I knew they wouldn't.....

[burner2014]

One tip if you get "private" packages even via DHL and Co.

Just send stuff second hand 🙂 e.g. without packaging. Used clothes and so on. 

 

You can value these items much lower as they are USED and Dirty and so you stay under certain tresholds.

 

Works quite well for me lately since they really enforce the 1500 THB limit.. 

 

But I think today I really had to pay that 7% on top of the package lmao... I had to pay 78 THB... but I am fine with that. They do it now differently they attach a letter to the package and write it big on it and still release it directly. I guess if the tax is low they do it like that because if I had to pay higher tax I had to make the online payment first before it was delivered the next day. (at least the online platform to pay the duty works flawless)

 

Thai Post delivers normal private DHL packages here in Thailand as well the small ones you send as a private person.

Please don't judge me if this is okay or not but I find it ridiculous to pay Import Taxes on some package that your family member sends you which is valued under 50$..... 

[FritsSikkink]

On 7/27/2024 at 7:49 AM, digbeth said:

there's an auction at the customs house every now and then of goods that's been 'stuck' or left by the owner refusing to pay customs/vat and possibly storage for every day it's been sitting in customs 

 

the worst outcome is your goods is destroyed, or Fedex send it back to the seller who can refund you

The seller doesn't have to refund you if the reason is you don't want to pay tax.

[KannikaP]

On 7/27/2024 at 7:05 AM, malt25 said:

Maybe if you offer the pay the duty in Baht & not Bahts they will waive the duty.

Hey, stop laughing at his small mistake....it is óffer TO pay the duty'.