What was the basis for VAT and tax calculation?
Original price 549 $ respecitvely 599 $, or didn’t this work out and they took the current price (799 $) as basis?
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Good question, the invoice document I got from DHL does only state the taxes and not the basis.
But I guess its the 599$. I payed 108€ tax on the total price of 691$ (phone+accessories) which was listed on the delivery slip. 108€ is roughly 19% of the converted price.
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for the time being no idea what the 109 € were for and from what they were calculated.
I suspect but that is customs and not VAT
Customs bill bill only states 12.50€ DHL fee (or to be precise a capital provisioning fee; essentially the fee that they are paying first and then demanding the money back from me) and 98.60€ EUSt (“Einfuhrumsatzsteuer” = import value added tax). Which would make the base value 518,95€, given a 19% tax rate, if I am not mistaken.
This roughly translates to a base value of USD 625 (depending on day and exchange rate) which seems about right, given that I added a battery of USD 29 to my original backing of USD 599.
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Compare your 12.50 to the 60 euros that DHL asks for customs fee in Greece. DHL is one of the worse companies in this respect. I can not believe that they ask 60 euros (plus of course the customs taxes). Next time I will not buy anything if DHL is involved.
I hope purism listens.
Yes, they listen!
Below calculation was my prediction (for Evergreen) if DHL Express used as delivery service and (if, was just my wish, but not optional one) I choose (it was kind of my provocative way to show where the difference is) to pay in advance for DHL Express delivery $30 (second number, just start calculation with 5XX+2%), which is absolutely obsolete for current deliveries:
As indeed, for Purism is DHL Express relatively expensive delivery option (yet as such not calculated to us as additional cost, from our Customs side). For us is this free delivery in its whole sense (cheaper option for sure, when calculating total cost). Therefore I’m thankful to Purism team for their decision to use DHL Express (for deliveries to EU)!
And now we have here transparent confirmation from @spaetz side, thanks!
EDIT: @antonis, is any of this customs services that apply to your upcoming delivery? Actually, just hope that this DHL Express site might help you further.
It is an amazing ripoff to demand 60€ in fees for handling this. On the other hand, I was surprised how manual the whole process is. I had to call somebody at DHL express twice and have them look up stuff, and allegedly customs are not allowed to open the packages themselves (pos secret) but require a post-employed person to open parcels for them. So overall I was quitepositively surprised by only a 12.5€ fee.
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Was it 14,88 Euro in total?
EDIT: Because 549+2%=559.98−549=10.98, therefore minimum of 12.50 Euro.
I gave the value 599 dollar in the clearance process and I suppose they used that because they did not complain. I also got an invoice from Purism that stated the value 599 dollar for the phone.
I did not pay anything to DHL - only VAT to customs. It is not really worth having DHL to handle the clearance because it took me only 10 minutes and was very simple (at least i Finland).
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No. 60 euros is only for the handling of DHL. I talked to them, they also sent me their fees price list. It is cheaper for items worth less than 150€.
Purism may have no other option for a carrier. I meant that they should seriously try to have a sales point in EU. In the end… I prefer to give 60 extra euros to Purism than to give them to DHL.
Take into account of how much is the level of wages in Greece. 60 euros for Germany is much much cheaper that 60 euros for Greece.
You are write but you have to live in the capital (or the entry point). If you are far from the capital then there is no way you can go to the customs to do it yourself.
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Just to make sure, we are referring here to DHL Express (delivery to your house payed by Purism) and not about ordinary DHL delivery service (or any other) as we followed with Chestnut/Dogwood?
In fact I am living 100 km to the east of the capital in a small village. Usually deliveries are not very fast but in this case it was. I cannot tell why but I can’t complain. And it was DHL Express through a small courier that has brought me parcels before. Maybe they just happened to go this way on Tuesday ?
Yes, of course, DHL Express.
Please let us know how this turned out at the end (after actual delivery), as I still hope for you that 60 Euro of additional charge isn’t something usual to be charged (hope this extra expense won’t fall onto your back) with this particular DHL Express parcel (except you live on some far away island 
).
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I received the phone. Yes I live on an island but this is irrelevant. DHL express charged me 60 euros just to pass the package through customs. I paid 192.88 euros. The VAT was 132.88 for L5, OpenPGP card and spare battery. The amount matches with the 24% VAT we have in Greece.
Actually since I know how DHL does bussiness I had asked Purism to use USPS, but they told me that they could not do so because of the extra battery. USPS (they told me) do not accept to carry batteries (although they accept them as part of the phone).
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… in Greece (only). I see your point now, as according to the Hellenic Post SA (ELTA SA) announcement, for “all mailed items marked as free by the Customs Authorities, i.e. without a customs declaration, the customs duty was and remains zero.” But …
since you mentioned that you’re delivery address is situated on an island that’s probably why it cost so much … i’m in mainland EU space a thousand km north of you and DHL-express charged me something like 15 Eddies or so, without 19% VAT tax for the LMv2 …
@reC, I saw somewhere that per shipment DHL Express charges 30.00 EUR when delivery arranged (exclusively) for Saturday. Plus minimum charge of 20.00 EUR for remote area delivery, but this particular customs calculation is exclusively related to Hellenic Post SA (ELTA SA) regulation to charge 15 Euros for parcels sent from Non-EU Countries (see my links above): “In order to receive parcels worth more than €150, customs duties are €15-50 depending on the cost of the package, plus 24% VAT and customs duties.” And, there isn’t anything to be generalized, said or connected to how DHL Express do the business (it is related to particular case distribution only, practice that isn’t usual or seen within inland post distribution inside other EU member countries, under other contracts that are related to DHL services).
Yes. DHLExpress mistreats us in Greece. It was worse in the past. 10 years ago I ordered from US some batteries for a weird ham radio device that I could not find batteries in EU. Cost was 36 USD. When the package arrived to Athens (and at that time I was located in Athens and not on an island) they called me and asked me to pay 100 euros for them plus VAT for the product. As a result of this I had to abandon my package. I could not pay 100 euros to DHL to pass something from customs of 36 USD worth. I re-ordered the package (paid another 36 USD. That company had free shipping as an offer for some time) and then I insisted they use USPS. The package arrived to my hands from Hellenic Post charging me the VAT plus 17 euros for them.
17 euros asked from Hellenic Post (which cooperates with USPS), 100 euros asked from DHL Express. Mistreatment is clear. And again I had to mess with DHL because I did the mistake to order a spare battery and USPS had changed their policy in the meantime and did not accept batteries.
Let me also add that DHL in Greece is absolutely slow. Slower than molasses… Sometimes it take them 2 and 3 weeks to bring packages from Germany to Greece., when other companies (say TNT) does this in a couple of days.
Anyone got experience with declaring customs if payment was done in cryptocurrency? What serves as a good “proof of payment”?
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