Only VAT and customs charges are the same for all carriers.
And only DHL standard shipping (not express shipping) seems to give the recipient the choice to either
claim the package at the customs office (providing documents and payments to the office), or
request an expensive “customs handling service” (providing the same documents, customs payments, and additional charges to the carrier, instead of directly to the customs office)
Others, including DHL express, UPS and more, seem to always do that customs service thing and charge varying rates, by default. At least if the recipient doesn’t happen to have some special arrangements in place.
We know that PPhone DHL Shipping costs $30,00 for delivery to EU if arranged/payed in advance. Therefore my info/upload shows that if nothing arranged (from Purism Carlsbad, CA, USA side) with DHL – in advance – German customers will pay at least $40,00 besides the fact that Purism already payed for delivery through … and this makes no sense to me … and related mainly to batch Dogwood (not being scheduled for delivery anyway). IMO, everything (related to VAT, certification, etc.) and in detail already discussed on this forum long time ago (if any lessons learned from L5 Chestnut shipment). And by the way (not having been clear and focused again … partial tooth of time dementia, partial language barrier), it was this info that made me happy yesterday:
NOTE: This is primarily related to batch Dogwood (developer edition) delivery, rest is for me obsolete to talk about, who (sender rather than recipient) is prearranging what.
No, those DHL offerings seem to include that customs handling by the carrier/courier service (DDU/DDP), which always has to be payed extra to the carrier/courier. So not that good.
Note that a service fee of 2,5% by some carriers would be much more for the L5 than the PinePhone.
So, it may simply be sending with the regular (US) standard postal service, what allows the recipient to pay only the VAT+import tax for the package, directly at the customs office (zoll), without having to pay extra carrier/courier service.
(But the (recipient’s) postal service may still allow to request and pay their service, as in the posted notice, if really needed.)
Looks like sending with standard US postal service could also lead to the least costly foreign local delivery, by the local postal service to the nearest customs office for pick-up by the receiver.
Yes, I agree with you (but don’t think I’m an expert). There will be an official letter from DHL informing customer within EU about particular delivery, but just several days open until someone decides how to proceed (pickup or delivery to living address) as nearby customs office (Zoll) will not keep package forever, on spot.
imo, depending on how much currency one person earns on a per hour basis, under a standard working week, it could actually be cheaper to pay DHL or whoever handles the shipping to ALSO handle the customs fees and what-not …
a few years back when people didn’t order so much from outside the border it was actually possible for me to be done with it in just a few hours … now i’m afraid i’d have to spend a whole working day just to sort this out …
or perhaps it will be possible to do it faster considering the lockdown
Did anyone here an update on this? This was promised in the campaign and since then I did not find any update on when this is expected to be done. I guess there is some time now to tackle this until October?
I did not get my Evergreen from Germany, but directly from the US (live in Sweden). I’d be surprised if that changes for future batches. So I had to pay import taxes.
