I want to buy a knife from a Polish knife maker price is 300$ with shipping, but am unsure about the import tax/customs fees. I have contacted the maker and he is also unsure. If anyone has any experience with import tax from Europe to USA I would greatly appreciate it.
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Import tax from Europe to USA
- Thread starter Andram
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I have already used this tool but I don't know if its accurate. Do you have any real life experience?
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I never paid anything on a knife I bought from Australia coming into the USA
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Speaking from the EU, we pay punitive customs charges for goods from the USA, I don't imagine you will be in a better position. Without going into murky politics, your current administration seems rather keen to create more and more tariffs on international trade. I won't comment on that either way other than to say that I very rarely buy anything directly from the USA because it is prohibitively expensive to do so. That is a great shame and I wish it were not so.
BTW, is there any reason you don't trust that online tool?!
Thank you for your comment, it's not that I don't trust the tool I just want to make sure by double checking from another source.
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I've never paid any import duties on knives I've bought from England, Spain, France, Germany, Norway, Finland, Thailand, China or Japan. They just show up in the mail like any other package.
eisman
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You should pay a Customs Duty (slightly different than a tax or tariff) on goods imported from the EU (which Poland is part of). In my experience (as an Importer of machine tools for several years) it averages around 17%. However, on small personal shipments it may not be charged. It will have to go thru Customs, and that's where the decision is made.
Note that this is not normally part of the shipment cost, and depending on the manner in which the package is shipped the costs can change considerably. For knives I would always have them marked as "Cutlery", and shipped to a non-business address. That should minimize the amount assessed and also the chance of "loss".
I have ordered several items from the EU in the past couple years and had no duty assessed for those items. Do be sure to have the correct values places on the declaration forms. Failure to this limits you ability to gain restitution should there be loss or damages in shipping. Always have anything shipped with a tracking number.
Note that this is not normally part of the shipment cost, and depending on the manner in which the package is shipped the costs can change considerably. For knives I would always have them marked as "Cutlery", and shipped to a non-business address. That should minimize the amount assessed and also the chance of "loss".
I have ordered several items from the EU in the past couple years and had no duty assessed for those items. Do be sure to have the correct values places on the declaration forms. Failure to this limits you ability to gain restitution should there be loss or damages in shipping. Always have anything shipped with a tracking number.