Hello there, been offered a omega watch from japan, £4000 brand new. Anyone have any idea what the import price will be?

 

There may be duty, and then there will be 20%VAT payable on the entire amount, that is:

(Watch + Duty + Shipping) x 20%.

Yes the VAT is chargeable on the duty and the shipping.

Are you ready to send all that money halfway round the world, for a watch you have not seen, likely to be unable to return very easily?

Buying from Japan can be very rewarding, especially for some of the LTD editions because the owners took such good care of them.

In your case, I have to wonder is it going to be worth the hassle, and worry? Imagine for example it has a small mark - imagine sending it back? (Through UK and Japanese customs - all of which are sick of people shipping goods declared as "Returns" in an attempt to avoid taxes).

Then imagine trying to talk to the Japanese dealer.....

Is it worth it? As long as it is, go for it!

 

Thank you for that, very helpful. The dealer is including postage and has sent me very in depth photos looks good. I understand what you mean. You have any idea what the price will be of import duty?

 

Well He wrote it total cost + 20%

 

Well yes but duty and VAT are not the same thing. In most cases of importing a single watch the duty element will be pretty much zero but as noted above you should expect to have to account for the VAT on the sale price and postage, plus a fixed processing fee of about £10-15. If the seller is including the postage it makes no difference. If the watch is circa £4K shipped, then the landed cost will be around £5,015 (plus or minus £10 maybe). It is very unlikely you will avoid this extra charge so I wouldn't bother kidding yourself you will.

As noted above, importing is not straight forward, is the piece really so hard to source in the EU? Is the saving worth taking the risk that the watch may be damaged as a return (and VAT reclaim) will be next to impossible. I have imported a couple of things without any problems but that was back when the GB pound was worth something vs the ROW currencies.

 

Ah I get it, sorry got confused, we have something similar here VAT is 21% and then Duty is separate component but in total it's not much (in comparison to 21% vat). My mistake.

 

I think our situation is very similar to your explanation. Duty exists but isn't always applied to individual watches, VAT at 20% is.

 

Op, I don't know if we've established in which country you are resident and therefore what rates of duty/vat apply?

Because of the 20% Duty on the value of the item plus 20% on the value of the postage I've pretty much written off personal imports of watches from the USA & Canada which might, at face value, have represented a bit of a discount. I've looked at pre-owned watches from Japan and sadly turned away for the same reason.
Confucius say "If import bargain becomes top dollar then why bother?"

 

I have given up on buying watches from outside the UK. Anything sent from outside the EU automatically attracts 20% VAT on arrival, because we are in the customs union and there are likely to be some sundry admin charges added by the courier as well. I once purchased a vintage Longines from the US that was originally exported from Switzerland to the US before VAT even existed in the UK, yet I still had to pay VAT when it came into the UK!

Even inside the EU, I am wary of buying watches, because I have found that couriers have small print exemptions where they are not liable for loss or damage to precious items including watches above a few hundred pounds. If the watch arrives with you but has a problem, you may well find it impossible to send back or uninsurable.

 

I have the same question on the total cost of a watch ($1900) from Japan after all fees are considered....???