How To Prepay Tax When Shipping To Thailand?

[donbury]

The last time I shipped to Thailand from the USA, my fiancee had to pay tax to get the item.

Now I want to ship again, and want to avoid the recipient getting hit for tax.

Any suggestions or comments?

Thanks.

Don Bury

[spacebass]

The last time I shipped to Thailand from the USA, my fiancee had to pay tax to get the item.

Now I want to ship again, and want to avoid the recipient getting hit for tax.

Any suggestions or comments?

Thanks.

Don Bury

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If you don't want the recipient getting hit for tax, don't ship!

The unpredictable nature of Thai customs is typical of third world countries (combined with no practical recourse), and if you ship with a courier that is likely to deliver, they pay whatever tax is demanded and the recipient has to reimburse them, end of story.

[COBBER]

If its a small item and your sending it by post there's a good chance you will get it through without having to pay any tax.

Anything larger , even if there's no tax due, the recipient will be slugged some sort of tea money. Thai customs are legendary as being the most corrupt government department.

[Smokin Joe]

Not positive this would work for Thailand but I believe Fedex has a place on the shipping forms to have tax and duty paid by the sender if you use a credit card for shipping and/or have a fedex account.

I did this for a box of Xmas presents sent to Panama a few years back and it worked out fine. Duty was charged to me.

Fedex seems to have a bad rep here for receiving. I've used UPS here for sending stuff from Thailand and was very happy with them so you might want to check with them.

[h90]

I think with FedEx, DHL, UPS you can checkmark that you pay the tax, but it might only work if you are approved for that.

But I don't recommend it, if the customs want some crazy tax, you have no chance to influence that.

I had already two crazy cases where they wanted 150 % tax, because they did not belive the original invoice and considered a different absolut crazy price.

if you pay it automatic, you loose a lot money, while I could refuse to pay it and reroute it to a other country, where it went true without any problem. Alternative you can also let them send it back.

I got 2 shipments with EMS and they told me to go there, what I did and that worked without any problems.

I would not do tax paied by sender, very risky...

The last time I shipped to Thailand from the USA, my fiancee had to pay tax to get the item.

Now I want to ship again, and want to avoid the recipient getting hit for tax.

Any suggestions or comments?

Thanks.

Don Bury

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[OldAsiaHand]

All of the above posters reflect my own experience. Payments made to customs here are, mostly, bribes, not actual duties in the sense you are thinking of.

Do not use Fed Ex under any circumstances. The local Fed Ex office is as much involved in scamming shippers as is customs. They not only will pass along to you whatever amount customs wants to change, even if there is no rationale behind it whatsoever, I've even had Fed Ex itself solicite a separate bribe from me in return for prompt delivery. When I refused to pay, the shipment 'disappeared' for two weeks then arrived badly damaged. I wrote their US office and documented the conduct of their people here, but was brushed off with a form letter. It seems that no one really wants to know.

Use EMS. It's not a sure route to avoiding duty, but your odds are the best.

[h90]

FedEx is bad, yes, but I had simillar shipments with FedEx and UPS and I paid more import tax for the UPS ones.

Once FedEx lost one shipment to Sweden value 3000 US$, amazing story, they were not even sorry about it.

"Your shipment is lost --- And???--- And what, nothing byby......"

At the end I got refund 4000 Baht......

All of the above posters reflect my own experience. Payments made to customs here are, mostly, bribes, not actual duties in the sense you are thinking of.

Do not use Fed Ex under any circumstances. The local Fed Ex office is as much involved in scamming shippers as is customs. They not only will pass along to you whatever amount customs wants to change, even if there is no rationale behind it whatsoever, I've even had Fed Ex itself solicite a separate bribe from me in return for prompt delivery. When I refused to pay, the shipment 'disappeared' for two  weeks then arrived badly damaged. I wrote their US office and documented the conduct of their people here, but was brushed off with a form letter. It seems that no one really wants to know.

Use EMS. It's not a sure route to avoiding duty, but your odds are the best.

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