FYI - Plaza Japan now charging tax (I assume UK VAT)

[Fish Slice 35]

13 minutes ago, alvinlwh said:

Here is my order from just over a month ago, £133 total, no VAT, and no charge on entry.

I think you may have missed that the OP spotted this had just changed.

I think it must have been changed in the last couple of days too because I paused on an order because I wanted some BBX bits they haven't listed yet and I thought I'd wait (due to no BBX yet!)

Try it yourself and see, if you have a UK delivery and go to check out less than £135 you should see 20% tax is now added.

Whatever the case, I'll still use PJ as I like them and all the miscellaneous other Japanese stuff I can order from them, and their service is fab. Can't blame them for UK tax either, or couriers' collection of said taxes.

[simalarion 2151]

@alvinlwh yes i got that part but I believe 135£ limit is incl shipping, if PJ started to add Vat on Uk orders up to £135 and do not include Shipping, this could be messy (?).

PJ did not add Vat to my order today, no VOEC code means im hit with tax handling & vat (as explained in detail over), but it still much cheaper than buying here and if im very lucky it slipps through:

 

[alvinlwh 5300]

5 minutes ago, Fish Slice said:

I think you may have missed that the OP spotted this had just changed

I did not, I was just showing simalarion how it used to be, this part.

34 minutes ago, simalarion said:

Oh so you in UK used to get PJ orders under £135 Vat free (incl shipping), but now PJ add Vat on all order up to 135 but forgot to incl shipping, this can potentially get messy.

 

[alvinlwh 5300]

7 minutes ago, simalarion said:

it still much cheaper than buying here and if im very lucky it slipps through:

It is much cheaper for you because you can get cheap postage. For whatever reason, JP refuses to resume regular airmail to UK.

My purchase pattern is more like a few bits when I need it rather than a large order in one go so ¥3388 for a bag of ¥130 screws is just not going to work. I just ordered 2 items from RCM yesterday, USD4.99 shipping for that which is perfectly reasonable (although VAT is charged on top).

[BuggyGuy 1090]

I order a lot from PJ - I still think it's worth it even with VAT.

For example M07 alloy hubs (#54781) - you commonly won't get these in the UK for less than £50 without shipping. They are £20 on PJ even now, so as long as your ordering a few bits at a time it's still a lot cheaper.

I tend to do an order that'll come in under £135 (inc. shipping) and just constantly have a basket ruining until I hit that amount and ship before I go over the threshold - this is still an economical way of bringing parts into the UK in my opinion.

I don't bother with PJ unless the price is less than 60% of a UK reseller though (for items that are £10 or more in the UK).

My recent DB01 build would have been over £600 if I'd only got parts from the UK, this went down to £500 if I expanded purchasing to the EU, and ended up at £350 when using PJ for as much as possible. So even with VAT PJ still wins for me.

[Sogogi 2426]

PJ is so much cheaper for m chassis tires stuff. 

50684 as an example, m chassis tires)

650 JPY (USD 4.5) vs USD 15 in US..

even considering tax and shipping, i think it still is a good deal.

[Juls1 1616]

Both Australian and UK governments are forcing international company’s to do this. I noticed it occurring simultaneously. While I don’t know if PJ are collecting Australian GST yet. 

Here in Australia any business with a turnover of $70,000 Australian dollars or more must legally collect GST. So customs records the value and qty of parcels coming through and then forces the international company’s to collect GST from Australian customers if they want to continue trading in Australia. So far for me it’s been, eBay, aliexpress, amazon, buyee and rcmart all charging/collecting GST. 
 

This is only going to get more and more as time goes on. But what it does do is makes you double think is it going to be competitive buying it locally, which for me if we are talking current models is almost always better buying kits locally. This didn’t used to be the case. However there is still little choice when it comes to parts. They don’t exist here. 

[Kowalski86 2187]

1 hour ago, Sogogi said:

PJ is so much cheaper for m chassis tires stuff. 

50684 as an example, m chassis tires)

650 JPY (USD 4.5) vs USD 15 in US..

even considering tax and shipping, i think it still is a good deal.

On some bodies (VW Beetle), you can get away with fitting Grasshopper/Hornet front tires over the M chassis rims. They're a little cheaper and taller.

Otherwise, a big reason why I don't run my M05 that much is due to how fast the kit tires lose their tread, and how costly they are once you tall up rims and foams (roughly as expensive as monster truck wheels for other manufacturers).

[Twinfan 765]

Thanks for correcting me @Fish Slice, you're right about the postage.  Apologies for my misunderstanding.

I think it's like this @alvinlwh,

Goods valued <= £135 minus postage: VAT obtained by Plaza Japan on the cost of the goods only.

Goods valued >£135: VAT obtained by the courier on entry to the UK and is now on the value of the goods AND the postage plus you have to pay a handling fee.  So at around £20 postage, that's an extra £4 plus a £12ish handling fee.

There's no grey area or risk of double taxing.

[alvinlwh 5300]

I had seen this a few times before.

https://eurora.com/blog/what-is-an-electronic-customs-declaration

While I had done little research into it, I suspect this electronic declaration will detail the package, "declared" value*, and most importantly, the sender and therefore tax status to the receiving country's customs#. This actually seem to speed up the process as I noticed my AE parcels sailing through HWDC very quickly ever since Brexit. Those companies that do not collect VAT seem to take a few days to enter, but still no invoice from RM (yet so far!).

# This still does not explain how I got double taxed with my earlier RCM purchase though.

* Declared value as unless the company's accounts are audited, there is still a possibility of underdeclaring. Not sure how the backend verification process works.

[Kpowell911 1238]

This is a good and bad thing for me. 
 

Because Hop Ups were so cheap on there, Id often spend a lot of money fully hopping up an RC such as my SRX. I think I spent more on hop ups than the kit. Lets be honest, 95% of hop ups are NEEDED, so if I dont sink money into potentially unecessary hop ups, I can use that money for an extra kit.....

[Twinfan 765]

And as of now, Japan Post is now available again for UK shipping which helps to offset to the VAT addition  

[alvinlwh 5300]

50 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

And as of now, Japan Post is now available again for UK shipping which helps to offset to the VAT addition  

Oh that is brilliant!

[Twinfan 765]

Yup!

I'm doing a test order as I was after a few bits and just tipped over the £135 limit to stop PJ collecting VAT.  I'm using Japan Post so it should come to my door via Royal Mail.

Let's see what PJ declare as the parcel value and whether I therefore get charged VAT before delivery...

[simalarion 2151]

PJ is very consistent adding all info on parcel from the order, so im very sure all will be there...

[alvinlwh 5300]

17 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

Yup!

I'm doing a test order as I was after a few bits and just tipped over the £135 limit to stop PJ collecting VAT.  I'm using Japan Post so it should come to my door via Royal Mail.

Let's see what PJ declare as the parcel value and whether I therefore get charged VAT before delivery...

The Japanese (PJ, 1999, etc) include the entire invoice on the package, so...

However there is still the luck factor, UKBA may still miss it.

[Twinfan 765]

I thought they did and I'm happy to pay the VAT no problem but we'll see how enthusiastic the Customs people are!

[alvinlwh 5300]

36 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

I thought they did and I'm happy to pay the VAT no problem but we'll see how enthusiastic the Customs people are!

It will be VAT plus customs tax (8% IIRC) plus RM "fine".

Actually I am interested if I order just below £135, but plus postage and VAT bringing it to £190+, will UKBA pick it up again like they did to me the last time. Saw something that I want/like but is £120 something. If the electronic pre import submission works as it should, then there should not be any double tax.

In any case, let us know how yours went. Good luck!

[Twinfan 765]

There's no import tax on RC, at least there wasn't when I had a Tamico order stopped.  So I'm just expecting VAT and a handling charge.

[alvinlwh 5300]

30 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

There's no import tax on RC, at least there wasn't when I had a Tamico order stopped.  So I'm just expecting VAT and a handling charge.

It is country dependent. I got it from RCM (HK). It depends on if UK has a trade deal with the country it was sent from in the scope of the deal.

https://www.simplyduty.com/

A quick check here shows that a "toy car"* has a 0% customs tax for Germany (EU), 2% for HK and 3.5% for JP.

* I am not sure the exact code model cars or model parts come under.

[Twinfan 765]

Cheers @alvinlwh, I had no idea it depended on where it was sent from and thought it was just on the goods imported. Every day is a school day!

Looking here, as long as the parts aren't classified as plastic (they shouldn't as it's metal parts plus a tool) it should be 0%:

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/commodities/9503007900

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/commodities/8204110000

[alvinlwh 5300]

4 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

Cheers @alvinlwh, I had no idea it depended on where it was sent from and thought it was just on the goods imported. Every day is a school day!

Looking here, as long as the parts aren't classified as plastic (they shouldn't as it's metal parts plus a tool) it should be 0%:

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/commodities/9503007900

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/commodities/8204110000

I cannot say for sure. I did got hit 2 years ago from HK but it did not seem to have the exact code.

Here is a sample of what I ordered.

I am no tax expert, just did the research when I got the tax bill back then.

[Twinfan 765]

It'll be random based on who assesses the package and how accurate they are I guess.  I'll find out in a couple of weeks but it's all good, I'll be receiving some fancy parts so it'll be a great day regardless!

[Twinfan 765]

On 9/29/2023 at 12:25 PM, Twinfan said:

Yup!

I'm doing a test order as I was after a few bits and just tipped over the £135 limit to stop PJ collecting VAT.  I'm using Japan Post so it should come to my door via Royal Mail.

Let's see what PJ declare as the parcel value and whether I therefore get charged VAT before delivery...

Well the parcel arrived a short while ago with no extra charges.  All the info was attached to the outside of the package, so it was either checked and accepted or ignored.  Either way, the test seems to have worked well this time  

[alvinlwh 5300]

45 minutes ago, Twinfan said:

Well the parcel arrived a short while ago with no extra charges.  All the info was attached to the outside of the package, so it was either checked and accepted or ignored.  Either way, the test seems to have worked well this time  

Lucky you! Looks like >£135 is the way to go.