[Rules p.1] Things that annoy you guys. 100 percent. Not gonna lie

It’s shocking that Sam Smith is an Oscar winner.

Victor Mistletoe wrote:Noisey eaters.

I know we've been over this many times before, but how the hell is it possible to be so oblivious to the disgusting slurping sloppy noises (context bait) that can be heard half way across the room? Shut the strawberry float up.

Most people don't hear it. You're just hypersensitive to these sounds.

ITV News' constant and blatant smear campaign against the Labour party.

First its the continual mentions of alleged anti-semitism which time and again Corbyn says the party is against any form of racism and they're investing all claims of it as legally required, yet there's been hardly any mention of similar claims of islamophobia in the Conservative party.

And now they keep banging on about how Corbyn doesn't watch the Queen's speech.

Partridge Iciclebubbles wrote:It’s shocking that Sam Smith is an Oscar winner.

Considering some of the crap which has won oscars over the years, this is hardly surprising.

Cheeky Devlin wrote:You're essentially paying for the work that goes into them customs clearing the goods for you. It pays for someone to take the details from the parcel label, look for the appropriate commodity code, process it through the customs systems, enter the charge onto their system, pay the charge to customs and then collect it from you.

All the couriers do this as well, because it's not covered by the cost of postage which is literally for moving the goods from A-B and doesn't take into account potential import charges (Because a lot of the time there aren't any). Royal Mail are actually the cheapest, with Parcelforce at £12 and couriers generally charging a percentage.

You can ask that Royal Mail or Parcelforce do not do that work for you, by getting the sender to mark the parcel as "To be customs cleared by importer". However you then need to do the import declaration yourself which is not something for the faint of heart. I do customs advice for my job and what you might save in the £8 you would almost certainly lose in time and sanity. There is a reason why companies make a lot of money doing these declarations for people professionally.

But it is a pain in the arse when you have something that is maybe only just over the £15 threshold as their fee will be bigger than the actual Customs charges.

I thought everything under a certain amount had no need to pay import tax or duty and so there's no point "handling it" and charging the handling fee because it can just be entered into market at zero rate. Does that then only happen if you're unlucky for something to be randomly seized and searched as well? I'm pretty sure I've imported stuff that had no fees whatsoever - and I'm not sure they were all gifts either.

Obviously I've paid VAT on stuff over the threshold and then usually the handling charge on top of that.

I think what you say about the fee in general is fair though. I've heard of people who've had stuff shipped to a port and not through a processing facility, so to get it they have to pay a customs broker to physically go there and negotiate its entry across the border and then pay even more to actually move it, because they will literally leave it on the dock and that's it. They generally think they've saved money importing something from China etc but not considered its subject to a quota or weights over a tonne or nobody bothered attaching anything to it.

Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

Girl next to me in the office just told us that her mum (who she lives with) has the norovirus, so no doubt that'll spread like wildfire through our office.

gooseberry fool and sick for Christmas

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

As part of eye treatment I'm an anti immune suppressants.

Woman at desk next to me is a coughing/blowing nose mess. "Don't worry I won't come the 6 feet over to you".

I'm going to die

Green Gecko wrote:

Cheeky Devlin wrote:You're essentially paying for the work that goes into them customs clearing the goods for you. It pays for someone to take the details from the parcel label, look for the appropriate commodity code, process it through the customs systems, enter the charge onto their system, pay the charge to customs and then collect it from you.

All the couriers do this as well, because it's not covered by the cost of postage which is literally for moving the goods from A-B and doesn't take into account potential import charges (Because a lot of the time there aren't any). Royal Mail are actually the cheapest, with Parcelforce at £12 and couriers generally charging a percentage.

You can ask that Royal Mail or Parcelforce do not do that work for you, by getting the sender to mark the parcel as "To be customs cleared by importer". However you then need to do the import declaration yourself which is not something for the faint of heart. I do customs advice for my job and what you might save in the £8 you would almost certainly lose in time and sanity. There is a reason why companies make a lot of money doing these declarations for people professionally.

But it is a pain in the arse when you have something that is maybe only just over the £15 threshold as their fee will be bigger than the actual Customs charges.

I thought everything under a certain amount had no need to pay import tax or duty and so there's no point "handling it" and charging the handling fee because it can just be entered into market at zero rate. Does that then only happen if you're unlucky for something to be randomly seized and searched as well? I'm pretty sure I've imported stuff that had no fees whatsoever - and I'm not sure they were all gifts either.

Obviously I've paid VAT on stuff over the threshold and then usually the handling charge on top of that.

I think what you say about the fee in general is fair though. I've heard of people who've had stuff shipped to a port and not through a processing facility, so to get it they have to pay a customs broker to physically go there and negotiate its entry across the border and then pay even more to actually move it, because they will literally leave it on the dock and that's it. They generally think they've saved money importing something from China etc but not considered its subject to a quota or weights over a tonne or nobody bothered attaching anything to it.

Two thresholds for import charges.

£15 and higher has Import VAT applied. £135 and higher will have Import Duty as well. A lot of places make it seem like there is only the £135 threshold then people get a surprise when they are charged VAT. They will literally only apply a handling fee where there is a charge to pay though. So if you bring in something that is around £40, but the VAT rate on it is 0% (Say childrens clothing for example), then there should be no charge and no handling fee (Assuming it's been declared as kids clothing, far too often it's just marked as "Clothes" and then charged).

In theory every parcel that comes in should be assessed by Royal Mail/Parcelforce and if it meets the criteria (Based on the details on the declaration label) have a charge applied. In practice due to the sheer volume of parcels and some human error, some things do slip through without charges when there should have been.

99% of parcels are not physically opened and checked by UK Border Force, instead there will be a mixture of random selections and anything that's been flagged up as perhaps needing a closer look. There are trends, especially around about Christmas for the type of thing they will pull aside for extra checks. Branded clothing and footwear from China/India is especially prone to being held for checks (Which can take a few weeks) simply due to the amount of counterfeit merchandise. Lots of fake guitars as well and Canada Goose jackets. If they catch fakes coming in they will flat out seize them and leave the importer out of pocket (So if it's too good to be true, it probably isn't worth the risk).

But yes, 99% of parcels have their charges applied based on the declaration label the sender has completed. If they get something wrong, or don't complete it properly then it can leave you with a charge that you have to pay before being able to dispute it.

Hexx wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

As part of eye treatment I'm an anti immune suppressants.

Woman at desk next to me is a coughing/blowing nose mess. "Don't worry I won't come the 6 feet over to you".

I'm going to die

Festivus Maximus wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

Girl next to me in the office just told us that her mum (who she lives with) has the norovirus, so no doubt that'll spread like wildfire through our office.

gooseberry fool and sick for Christmas

Thoughts and prayers guys.

Lets all meet up when we're wiv da angels

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:

Hexx wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

As part of eye treatment I'm an anti immune suppressants.

Woman at desk next to me is a coughing/blowing nose mess. "Don't worry I won't come the 6 feet over to you".

I'm going to die

Festivus Maximus wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

Girl next to me in the office just told us that her mum (who she lives with) has the norovirus, so no doubt that'll spread like wildfire through our office.

gooseberry fool and sick for Christmas

Thoughts and prayers guys.

Lets all meet up when we're wiv da angels

Please I'm going to spend eternity in the arms of baby Jesus but I expect you'll be going somewhere....hotter.

Hexx wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:

Hexx wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

As part of eye treatment I'm an anti immune suppressants.

Woman at desk next to me is a coughing/blowing nose mess. "Don't worry I won't come the 6 feet over to you".

I'm going to die

Festivus Maximus wrote:

Jenu-All I Want For Christmas wrote:Surrounded by the coughing and sneezing crew at work again today.

Feel like I should have worn a bloody gas mask and a sodding haz-mat suit to protect me from this gooseberry fool.

Stay at home you ill strawberry floaters!

Girl next to me in the office just told us that her mum (who she lives with) has the norovirus, so no doubt that'll spread like wildfire through our office.

gooseberry fool and sick for Christmas

Thoughts and prayers guys.

Lets all meet up when we're wiv da angels

Please I'm going to spend eternity in the arms of baby Jesus but I expect you'll be going somewhere....hotter.

Please, I raise the temperature wherever I go.

Cheeky Devlin wrote:

Green Gecko wrote:

Cheeky Devlin wrote:You're essentially paying for the work that goes into them customs clearing the goods for you. It pays for someone to take the details from the parcel label, look for the appropriate commodity code, process it through the customs systems, enter the charge onto their system, pay the charge to customs and then collect it from you.

All the couriers do this as well, because it's not covered by the cost of postage which is literally for moving the goods from A-B and doesn't take into account potential import charges (Because a lot of the time there aren't any). Royal Mail are actually the cheapest, with Parcelforce at £12 and couriers generally charging a percentage.

You can ask that Royal Mail or Parcelforce do not do that work for you, by getting the sender to mark the parcel as "To be customs cleared by importer". However you then need to do the import declaration yourself which is not something for the faint of heart. I do customs advice for my job and what you might save in the £8 you would almost certainly lose in time and sanity. There is a reason why companies make a lot of money doing these declarations for people professionally.

But it is a pain in the arse when you have something that is maybe only just over the £15 threshold as their fee will be bigger than the actual Customs charges.

I thought everything under a certain amount had no need to pay import tax or duty and so there's no point "handling it" and charging the handling fee because it can just be entered into market at zero rate. Does that then only happen if you're unlucky for something to be randomly seized and searched as well? I'm pretty sure I've imported stuff that had no fees whatsoever - and I'm not sure they were all gifts either.

Obviously I've paid VAT on stuff over the threshold and then usually the handling charge on top of that.

I think what you say about the fee in general is fair though. I've heard of people who've had stuff shipped to a port and not through a processing facility, so to get it they have to pay a customs broker to physically go there and negotiate its entry across the border and then pay even more to actually move it, because they will literally leave it on the dock and that's it. They generally think they've saved money importing something from China etc but not considered its subject to a quota or weights over a tonne or nobody bothered attaching anything to it.

Two thresholds for import charges.

£15 and higher has Import VAT applied. £135 and higher will have Import Duty as well. A lot of places make it seem like there is only the £135 threshold then people get a surprise when they are charged VAT. They will literally only apply a handling fee where there is a charge to pay though. So if you bring in something that is around £40, but the VAT rate on it is 0% (Say childrens clothing for example), then there should be no charge and no handling fee (Assuming it's been declared as kids clothing, far too often it's just marked as "Clothes" and then charged).

In theory every parcel that comes in should be assessed by Royal Mail/Parcelforce and if it meets the criteria (Based on the details on the declaration label) have a charge applied. In practice due to the sheer volume of parcels and some human error, some things do slip through without charges when there should have been.

99% of parcels are not physically opened and checked by UK Border Force, instead there will be a mixture of random selections and anything that's been flagged up as perhaps needing a closer look. There are trends, especially around about Christmas for the type of thing they will pull aside for extra checks. Branded clothing and footwear from China/India is especially prone to being held for checks (Which can take a few weeks) simply due to the amount of counterfeit merchandise. Lots of fake guitars as well and Canada Goose jackets. If they catch fakes coming in they will flat out seize them and leave the importer out of pocket (So if it's too good to be true, it probably isn't worth the risk).

But yes, 99% of parcels have their charges applied based on the declaration label the sender has completed. If they get something wrong, or don't complete it properly then it can leave you with a charge that you have to pay before being able to dispute it.

Thanks for the info mate, really useful. I must have failed to commit to memory the VAT threshold was so low at the moment, or I blended it with the gift threshold. There is also the fact I am so often trying to dig up state and federal tax information for US customers who have no clue about their obligations as an importer (which aren't mine), so I confuse those with my own import regs

Indeed, I am really careful to make sure all of my decelerations are very detailed and I also include the tariff number, so on the outbound side I never really have any problems. It does annoy me a bit when you import things and it says something like "parts" or "toy" or "textiles" which mean strawberry float all. Having read large sections of the UK Trade Tariff in full, it is FAR more complicated than that and a strawberry floating nightmare should you suddenly need to export something that has cross references or doesn't necessarily exist. Example, certian products are essentially only classifiable as thing: other: other: other (to be fair you can sometimes take advantage of the ambiguity to net a lower tax threshold for the non-EU importer).

The UK Trade Tariff and Harmonised Tariff Schedule of the United States (HTSUS) also don't agree on classifications for some things, even though the whole point of the system is that it IS "harmonised" by the world trade organisation. Ballache. I used to include both classifications on my CN22s but now I've thought strawberry float that and only use the UK tariff number; CBP can deal with it.

Oh and it's going to be SO MUCH FUN dealing with importing stuff from Europe when almost everything requires declarations.

Green Gecko wrote:

Cheeky Devlin wrote:

Green Gecko wrote:

Cheeky Devlin wrote:You're essentially paying for the work that goes into them customs clearing the goods for you. It pays for someone to take the details from the parcel label, look for the appropriate commodity code, process it through the customs systems, enter the charge onto their system, pay the charge to customs and then collect it from you.

All the couriers do this as well, because it's not covered by the cost of postage which is literally for moving the goods from A-B and doesn't take into account potential import charges (Because a lot of the time there aren't any). Royal Mail are actually the cheapest, with Parcelforce at £12 and couriers generally charging a percentage.

You can ask that Royal Mail or Parcelforce do not do that work for you, by getting the sender to mark the parcel as "To be customs cleared by importer". However you then need to do the import declaration yourself which is not something for the faint of heart. I do customs advice for my job and what you might save in the £8 you would almost certainly lose in time and sanity. There is a reason why companies make a lot of money doing these declarations for people professionally.

But it is a pain in the arse when you have something that is maybe only just over the £15 threshold as their fee will be bigger than the actual Customs charges.

I thought everything under a certain amount had no need to pay import tax or duty and so there's no point "handling it" and charging the handling fee because it can just be entered into market at zero rate. Does that then only happen if you're unlucky for something to be randomly seized and searched as well? I'm pretty sure I've imported stuff that had no fees whatsoever - and I'm not sure they were all gifts either.

Obviously I've paid VAT on stuff over the threshold and then usually the handling charge on top of that.

I think what you say about the fee in general is fair though. I've heard of people who've had stuff shipped to a port and not through a processing facility, so to get it they have to pay a customs broker to physically go there and negotiate its entry across the border and then pay even more to actually move it, because they will literally leave it on the dock and that's it. They generally think they've saved money importing something from China etc but not considered its subject to a quota or weights over a tonne or nobody bothered attaching anything to it.

Two thresholds for import charges.

£15 and higher has Import VAT applied. £135 and higher will have Import Duty as well. A lot of places make it seem like there is only the £135 threshold then people get a surprise when they are charged VAT. They will literally only apply a handling fee where there is a charge to pay though. So if you bring in something that is around £40, but the VAT rate on it is 0% (Say childrens clothing for example), then there should be no charge and no handling fee (Assuming it's been declared as kids clothing, far too often it's just marked as "Clothes" and then charged).

In theory every parcel that comes in should be assessed by Royal Mail/Parcelforce and if it meets the criteria (Based on the details on the declaration label) have a charge applied. In practice due to the sheer volume of parcels and some human error, some things do slip through without charges when there should have been.

99% of parcels are not physically opened and checked by UK Border Force, instead there will be a mixture of random selections and anything that's been flagged up as perhaps needing a closer look. There are trends, especially around about Christmas for the type of thing they will pull aside for extra checks. Branded clothing and footwear from China/India is especially prone to being held for checks (Which can take a few weeks) simply due to the amount of counterfeit merchandise. Lots of fake guitars as well and Canada Goose jackets. If they catch fakes coming in they will flat out seize them and leave the importer out of pocket (So if it's too good to be true, it probably isn't worth the risk).

But yes, 99% of parcels have their charges applied based on the declaration label the sender has completed. If they get something wrong, or don't complete it properly then it can leave you with a charge that you have to pay before being able to dispute it.

Thanks for the info mate, really useful. I must have failed to commit to memory the VAT threshold was so low at the moment, or I blended it with the gift threshold. There is also the fact I am so often trying to dig up state and federal tax information for US customers who have no clue about their obligations as an importer (which aren't mine), so I confuse those with my own import regs

Indeed, I am really careful to make sure all of my decelerations are very detailed and I also include the tariff number, so on the outbound side I never really have any problems. It does annoy me a bit when you import things and it says something like "parts" or "toy" or "textiles" which mean strawberry float all. Having read large sections of the UK Trade Tariff in full, it is FAR more complicated than that and a strawberry floating nightmare should you suddenly need to export something that has cross references or doesn't necessarily exist. Example, certian products are essentially only classifiable as thing: other: other: other (to be fair you can sometimes take advantage of the ambiguity to net a lower tax threshold for the non-EU importer).

The UK Trade Tariff and Harmonised Tariff Schedule of the United States (HTSUS) also don't agree on classifications for some things, even though the whole point of the system is that it IS "harmonised" by the world trade organisation. Ballache. I used to include both classifications on my CN22s but now I've thought strawberry float that and only use the UK tariff number; CBP can deal with it.

Oh and it's going to be SO MUCH FUN dealing with importing stuff from Europe when almost everything requires declarations.

I'm quite lucky in that I'm not there to talk about other countries, so I can just say "Go speak to them".

The tariff codes should be universal for the first 6 digits, after that there is variation depending on where you go. We get a lot of people calling in with Chinese HS codes.

But yeah, I've seen some classifications be super vague on postal declarations.

Yeah, I've normally noticed it's the first couple of digits that match and then it goes off on its own.

I have found the legal determinations actually made by CBP which can be accessed via their "CROSS" system, to vary from what I would determine using the UK information, which can be confusing (as naturally one wonders if a determination differs over there then are they going to accept what you think etc). They are small items shirts and stickers etc. so really it should be extremely small onions.

Go into travel agents to get a quote on something
"Oh the travel company we do that through isn't open on Saturdays"
What the hell kind of holiday travel company isn't open at weekends, the time when most people will be looking at holidays?

Lagamorph wrote:Go into travel agents to get a quote on something
"Oh the travel company we do that through isn't open on Saturdays"
What the hell kind of holiday travel company isn't open at weekends, the time when most people will be looking at holidays?

Thomas Cook

Technological solutions to problems that can and have been fixed with much easier solutions before.

We got a real Christmas tree today and one of these wire ratchet stands that you put the damn thing in and ratchet closed to hold it in place and put some water in. Less than an hour after getting it all done we noticed it was leaking, so had to spend an hour getting it out, filling a goddamn bucket with sand/earth and reseating the thing, whereas if we'd done that in the first place, like people for decades before us it, would have been fine.

See also: the electronic scales with WiFi and all that gooseberry fool that are never used because can they do as advertised and detect who's who somehow? Can they strawberry float. After spending a while resetting apps, logging into accounts, resetting the thing and all that gooseberry fool it has never been used since. Guess what would work? A basic, dumb set of scales and a goddamn notepad and paper.

Why would scales need wifi?

Cuđđoolph wrote:Why would scales need wifi?

So that they can be subjected to software 'updates'

It's only a matter of time before the scales' updates allow them to decide that they hate having to weigh things for you, and so rise up against their oppressive master.