Import Tax on Computer?

LT, these are bare minimum costs.  Actual costs are almost certain to be higher by the time the EC bureaucrats get done with you and your teacher....

Cost of gift                                           $100

DHL or other courier shipping*                67

New EC tariff on courier shipments         42

ICE Consumption Tax @ 20%-plus         33.40
  (based on value, insurance, freight)
                                                               
Total                                                       $242.40

Nobody on this blog can tell you with certainty how much the opaque EC customs agency known as SENAE will ultimately charge your teacher, or how much agony they will put your teacher through before this process would be over.

*Don't even think about sending this through the regular mails.
DHL charge is based on what I paid DHL to send a small package from Quito to New York last week.  I did not have enough information to price the exact freight cost on your possible shipment.

everything is OK here, except ship some IT things into this country. Although it don't even manufacture a piece of computer, put so high tax on it.

cccmedia wrote:

New EC tariff on courier shipments         42

ICE Consumption Tax @ 20%-plus         33.40
  (based on value, insurance, freight)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if the package is declared as a "gift" (which it would be), would that not avoid the $42 tariff? If not, does the $42 only apply to "couriers", and not international mail (USPS transferred to Ecuador mail service)? We've shipped her a package before using USPS International and it was received fine. Finally, is the "ICE Consumption Tax" the tariff itself? In other words, if $99 tablet, would that the tariff be ~$20?

languagetraveler wrote:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if the package is declared as a "gift" (which it would be), would that not avoid the $42 tariff? If not, does the $42 only apply to "couriers", and not international mail (USPS transferred to Ecuador mail service)? We've shipped her a package before using USPS International and it was received fine. Finally, is the "ICE Consumption Tax" the tariff itself? In other words, if $99 tablet, would that the tariff be ~$20

t

The call-it-a-gift strategy is wishful thinking.  A further problem is that packages that qualify for exemptions from the new tariff require advance notice to SENAE and, despite my repeated requests to Ximena Lopes, the Correos official who notified me about this, she has failed to provide the information about HOW to pre-notify.

The Consumption tax is not the same as the new tariff.  ICE is based on the combination of value of the shipment, freight costs, and insurance...and thus, as shown in my previous post...is considerably more than the 20 percent of the gift alone.

The wily dogs at SENAE conceivably will tack on unforeseen additional taxes based on their creative imaginations, and they may refuse even to consider an appeal once they have mis-"categorised" a package.  (Based on recent experience.)

They can tack on whatever charges they can invent, stonewall your teacher's attempt to reason with them, and then require your teacher to abandon the package in favor of the state...or else fight it in the EC bureaucracy (what I call "the nightmare scenario").

If you have had success with UPS, you can contact them.   I am sure you'll find that costs are up (although they conceivably could charge slightly less than DHL for the basic service).

The new tariff applies to DHL, UPS and all other couriers, including Club Correos, an international package "service" of the government.  This "Club" is another disaster waiting for you.   A package of family documents sent from New York by my sister on September 16th using this Correos system still has not arrived in December!

cccmedia in Quito

languagetraveler wrote:

does the $42 only apply to "couriers", and not international mail (USPS transferred to Ecuador mail service)...

This question about USPS shipments being transferred to Ecuador mail service is real "inside baseball" and beyond my ability to answer competently.

Keep in mind that once your shipment gets into the hands of Correos del Ecuador, it may no longer be insured, and is subject to months of delays.

Since the new tariff system was announced -- and then implementation of it was delayed for a month until October -- the delays in the Correos system have, in my experience, been absurdly long.

cccmedia in Quito

cccmedia wrote:

A package of family documents sent from New York by my sister on September 16th using this Correos system still has not arrived in December!

cccmedia in Quito

I know you now know this, but club correos long ago exlained that their service was for specific types of shipments. I knew an expat who used her po box as her credit card maling address and then acted surprised when club correos didn't forward her new credit card.  Of course these type of problems are attrubutable to communication problems.

Nards Barley wrote:

I know you now know this, but club correos long ago explained that their service was for specific types of shipments. I knew an expat who used her po box as her credit card mailing address and then acted surprised when club correos didn't forward her new credit card.  Of course these type of problems are attributable to communication problems.

.

Nards is 100 percent correct.

And this is why I dropped Club Correos and its ESL-engendered communications disasters, and will be using US Global Mail or another U.S.-based, English speaking freight-forwarder going forward.

cccmedia in Quito

I use U.S. Global Mail as my mailing service in the U.S..  While I haven't checked the rates in over a year, I couldn"t justify the shipping cost (of shipping goods) when compared wirh club correos. Now of course, I can't justify shipping anything from the U.S., for now at least.