Paying import duty

My wife has send dozens of balikbayan boxes from the US over the last 30 years and never paid duty or vat.  Try a different shipping company. 

           Most recent box we sent in October, arrived in Ilocos Sur on November 30, no taxes or fees. The $70/ box we pay is shipped from New Jersey and delivered to our house.

    Hello, I am British and for the past few years I have been regularly sending boxes to my Filipino daughter in law, I am sending stuff like clothes and toys and books for my grandchildren.  She was never required to pay import duty before now. The last 3 boxes I sent her with similar contents to all the previous boxes, she had to pay a total of 27,000 pesos import duty. I want to see a breakdown of the import duty but she is never given or sent any paperwork just told to pay the delivery driver.Anyone got advice on dealing with Philippines Customs import duties.RegardsRon

-@Tefmentax

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First question Who is your shipping company? Are you sending it by Royal Mail? or some private company like DHL?

Your shipping company may ask the value and if you increase it for insurance purposes, that's what your going to pay duties on.

Use a balikan shipper next time and a low declared value.

Is it possible she is not telling the truth?

Are you sending the duty fees to her directly as reimbursement for maybe nonexistent fees?

Sounds to me like the driver is scamming recipients for extra cash if there is no paperwork to justify extra fees. If the driver shows anything on paper, she should take a pic with her phone. But off the top, it sounds like a street level scam by the driver the shipping company may not be aware of and may not appreciate.

Filipinos follow expat forums religiously to gain useful incite. They might not post comments or even register to post but they're reading and learning behind the scenes. Anytime a raging idiot brags about what a big tipper he is or how cheap things are in PH compared to his home neckredland in Oz (for example), he creates a skin tax for other expats and promotes inflation everywhere we go. Only takes one bloviating blowhard who cannot control his beerhole. Cheers!

@jozica

Edit: I meant "insight" not "incite"

        Hello, I am British and for the past few years I have been regularly sending boxes to my Filipino daughter in law, I am sending stuff like clothes and toys and books for my grandchildren.  She was never required to pay import duty before now. The last 3 boxes I sent her with similar contents to all the previous boxes, she had to pay a total of 27,000 pesos import duty. I want to see a breakdown of the import duty but she is never given or sent any paperwork just told to pay the delivery driver.Anyone got advice on dealing with Philippines Customs import duties.RegardsRon

-@Tefmentax
************************************
First question Who is your shipping company? Are you sending it by Royal Mail? or some private company like DHL?
Your shipping company may ask the value and if you increase it for insurance purposes, that's what your going to pay duties on.

Use a balikan shipper next time and a low declared value.

Is it possible she is not telling the truth?

Are you sending the duty fees to her directly as reimbursement for maybe nonexistent fees?
   

    -@Enzyte Bob

I seem to recall there was a plan by customs to scan and open balikbayan boxed and it caused outrage and was dropped so I can only assume you are not  sending a balikbayan box just a regular courier shipment or something through the post office.

Thanks to everyone for your comments and advice. I am now going to ditch my regular shipper DHL. I have never send Balikbayan boxes before now as someone once told me the delivery time from the UK is 2 to 3 months,  I am presently looking for a UK shipper to get their prices and delivery times.

regards,

Ron

I don't know about UK, but USA is typically 2-3 months to get to destination in Phils. I used Atlas for my Balikbayan box and I'm getting ready to have sister-in-law do some shopping for me and send another box or two. I wonder if a Stihl (a real one) chain saw can fit in the largest box? Without the bar attached of course.

Larry Fisher said. . . . I don't know about UK, but USA is typically 2-3 months to get to destination in Phils. I used Atlas for my Balikbayan box and I'm getting ready to have sister-in-law do some shopping for me and send another box or two. I wonder if a Stihl (a real one) chain saw can fit in the largest box? Without the bar attached of course.

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Your sister-in-law might tape the boxes together like Moon Dog has done. When I lived in Las Vegas we had the choice of several Balikbayan shippers, so we always choose the cheapest one at the time, also avoiding no name shippers.

Shippers from Las Vegas bundle their customers boxes and ship to LA where the port of exit is. Popular shippers in Las Vegas have bundles more often to send to LA.
   

@Enzyte Bob

Taping the largest boxes together? Seriously? They're already max weight or near for us normally.  I don't believe they'd allow that.

Larry Fisher said. . . .Taping the largest boxes together? Seriously? They're already max weight or near for us normally.  I don't believe they'd allow that.

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Moon Dog several times has posted about stacking & taping boxes together, which I found interesting.

Also I never heard of weight restrictions on Balikayan Boxes. I often had to help the skinny Filipino agent to lift our Balikayan box onto his box dolly or into his fan.

Also I would tip the agent $5 and he would give us boxes for free for future shipments.
   

   

    Larry Fisher said. . . .Taping the largest boxes together? Seriously? They're already max weight or near for us normally.  I don't believe they'd allow that.
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Moon Dog several times has posted about stacking & taping boxes together, which I found interesting.
Also I never heard of weight restrictions on Balikayan Boxes. I often had to help the skinny Filipino agent to lift our Balikayan box onto his box dolly or into his fan.

Also I would tip the agent $5 and he would give us boxes for free for future shipments.       
   

    -@Enzyte Bob

My last one with Atlas was something around 155-175# max. I don't recall exactly.  But he needed help from the dolly to the van floor. I always tip.

@Larry Fisher

My wife and I have taped boxes together once before due to tall items. The shipper accepted it and said no problem.

We ship multiple boxes multiple times a year, no duty unless we declare duty or laptop or something like that.

I have been using forexcargo.us. They will pick up in the US and deliver in the Philippines, don't think they have service in the UK.

I have never had to pay customs on the sea shipments, just a reasonable shipping cost. The only time I had to pay extra was when I was moving here had shipped an iMac in an iMac box. Very obviously a valuable item. If it had been in a plain box, there would not have been customs charge.

On the air shipments, I have to tell the company the value of the items in the shipment. They do not question the number I give them. There is no breakdown of the shipping cost; the invoice merely notes weight and insured value. So apparently, the value number I give them is just for insurance purposes.

I agree with the other posters, it's probably a scam if there's no paperwork. Filipinos are very big on paperwork; it creates lots of jobs (many unnecessarily). I would refuse delivery until I could contact the company directly and find out what's going on.

@Tefmentax

We used Belwood U.K. who pick up Balicbayan boxes from wherever you live, for about a year before we moved here last June. Never any problem but takes 2 to 3 months.

For me unfortunately there's no real answer. My belongings are in Montana... So it's Fedex or UPS and you pay as much to ship them to LBC Seattle as LBC charges to get them to Philippines. I played around with car rentals etc.. SO I am flying with 5 check bags.. We'll see how this goes 

@Tefmentax

In the past we have used LBC to ship many boxes from the middle east back to Philippines with no issues.

They are a specialist Balikbayan shipping company and have an office in the UK, try giving them a call, link below.

Good luck

https://www.lbcexpress.com/contact-support