It's £18
HMRC have a webpage on it, entitled 'buying on the internet', although really it's importing stuff not buying on t'web at all
HMRC webpage
If you purchase goods through the Internet you should be aware that customs duty and VAT will be payable, as follows.
- Customs duty - if the amount of duty is £7 and over.
- Import VAT - if the value of the goods is £18 and over.
The way it works in practice is that they sub-contract the collection of the duty & VAT to the carrier/import company, who can also charge you a handling/collection fee for doing it.
I bought something from the US last year for $150 plus $30 USPS international shipping, USPS then obviously delivered it to Parcel Farce in Liverpool.
Parcel Farce dropped a card through my letterbox saying I needed to pay the VAT on the $150, no mention of duty, and (IIRC) something like £15 handling fee and they were going to redeliver the following day.
Since the reason I hadn't been in to receive it because I was at work and that would be the case the day after, I rang the number on the card to be told I could either rearrange delivery on one further occasion, Monday to Friday, or could drive to Liverpool and collect from their depot. If I hadn't done either, in 30 days they'd send it back.
I couldn't have it delivered to a post office and then collect and pay the fee there, because Parcel Farce is a different division of the post office. I couldn't have it delivered to work as that was in a different depot's area.
Great !
I ended-up arranging it to be delivered to a neighbour's address and leaving them a cheque to pay the fee.
The UK price was about £185, I ended-up paying something like £108 so it was worth it, it was just Parcel Farce being a complete arse about delivering it.