I ran into this a few years ago on a Caygill frame from England. DHL had paid the duty, then billed me for it. But they overpaid, as they paid for a complete bike, while a frameset is a much lower duty. I protested and paid the lower duty.
Go to the US Customs Service website and look up the duty for the goods in question. It is possible that used bike parts should have a lower duty than new ones, or perhaps no duty at all.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Big Spring, Texas, USA
> From: globallyoff@s2ki.com <globallyoff@s2ki.com>
> Subject: Re: [CR] Customs charges on ebay items from Europe?
> To: "Mitch Harris" <mitch.harris@gmail.com>
> Cc: "classic Rendezvous" <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
> Date: Tuesday, March 10, 2009, 10:00 PM
> Unfortunately, it sounds legitimate to me. I think UPS
> turns over the
> duty paid to to appropriate governments. I hadn't
> considered that when I
> recently used "buy it now" on ebay for some
> Universal 61/68 NOS brake
> levers. I will let everyone know if I have to pay a large
> duty.
>
> Maybe you should contest the value of the item being taxed.
> It shouldn't
> be 100% tax.
>
> Keith Kessel
> Shreveport, La.
> USA
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, March 10, 2009 4:04 pm, Mitch Harris wrote:
> > Just received a bill from UPS for $90 customs charges
> for an item
> > purchased from Germany several weeks ago. This is
> almost as much as the
> > item cost, and I haven't seen a customs charge
> like this in years of
> > buying from Eurpean sellers on ebay. This was a large
> dealer/seller on
> > ebay that has very good feedback and for which there
> was no report of
> > customs difficulties--report was that they handled all
> this through their
> > bonded shipping. Anyone seen this?
> >
> > "Merchandise released by customs is done under
> bond and is subject ot
> > redelivery to customs on demand. Failure to rerturn
> mehcandise makes the
> > consignee subject to penalty for sull amount of
> bond..."
> >
> > Why is the bill from UPS if it's US customs?
> >
> >
> > Why and how can UPS bill me if I did not contract
> business with them?
> > Isn't this the seller's obligation if it's
> part of the UPS service?
> >
> >
> > Why does it sound like they demanding return of
> merchandise--just
> > return if payment is not made?
> >
> > Does this mean that the ebay seller did not pay some
> part of the duty
> > that he was supposed to according to the shipping
> charges agreement?
> >
> > It's weird to pay a bill that you don't know
> the legitimacy of,
> > especially in these days of scams. Should my next
> contact be the seller,
> > or UPS, or customs?
> >
> > Mitch Harris
> > Little Rock Canyon, Utah, USA
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