Receiving shipped household items in Budapest

Jonbalatontime wrote:

Can anyone share their experience with receiving household goods shipment in Budapest, where to clear customs declaration, and arranging delivery of pallet shipment to house?

Yes but where from?  We need some clues. If inter-EU, then straight to your door. 

Otherwise, shipper does it.  Too difficult for individuals.

Did this about10 years ago from Las Vegas to Budapest.
Once again, I have a terrible story behind this "adventure"
There is a customs house on the outskirts of Budapest where we went in , just check the internet for their address.Sorry even thinking of them makes my skin crawl don't want to look up their address and get nervous again.
At the time , 10 years back we didn't notice anyone there who spoke English,may of changed by now but if possible I would bring a HU speaker with you.
We found a great shipper in Vegas who we paid about $600. for 12 boxes to ship over, they came to our home and picked everything up in the price as well.
We knew as a returning Hungarian citizen my husband was not required to pay any customs to bring in his own personal household items.
Think that is why we had troubles with the customs agents, they may of resented him for that and so the trouble began.
We were contacted that our things had arrived and the trucking co. had placed them in a warehouse between Budapest and Erd.
We were told that the boxes arrived in Sofia or some other city in the South and that the price for the trucking from there to the warehouse was not yet paid for, they were holding our personal items until payment was made, about another $600. for the trucking plus daily rates for the warehouse until they were removed from their storage.
We paid, found a truck but were told we needed a paper from customs first,Went to customs and they gave us a run around, told us to come back in a few days with some other papers from the warehouse just a silly run around.
Finally all was in order and my husband hired a private mover to bring the boxes up to our flat.
Customs called the house and said we were not allowed to open our boxes at all or face court or arrest until they sent over a agent to physically watch us removed the customs labels and fixtures they had wrapped around every box. Seals and stamps on every box.
They didn't know when they would show up, within 10 days time.
They never came over and finally we got a call that we were cleared to open our boxes!!
Insane or what????
We honestly feel they thought it would be funny to mess with us for no reason other then perhaps they resented my husband for ever coming home again. No reason for all that hassle.
I can't even tell you about the stress they gave us,Thought my husband would have a heart attack over the stress, we didn't want to lose our things with just $600 holding us back.
Oh yes, when we shipped over our items I did make a general list of what was inside each and every box. They demanded that we list every thing little item in each box and told us that if and when they came over to watch us open the boxes that if the list was wrong we were in serious legal trouble.
I sat up all night long racking my brain to remember every little scarf, dish and sheet i put in each box.Made a new list the best I could remember and hoped to God it would work out, I will never ship another thing  again to HU or anywhere.
Best to just bring as many suitcases with you and buy everything else over here.

True story, hard to believe.Guess that's what happens when you take care of business yourself and no one can make a buck off of you.
I did contact the shipper in Vegas to tell them our horror story,they had little experience shipping to Hungary and were very sorry but that's the info they had, they thought it was all the way to HU not some dock in the Southern part of Europe.
Maybe someone dummy read Bulgaria and not Hungaria , I saw the boxes in the warehouse in Vegas before they were shipped out, they clearly read Hungary. Just too many things went so wrong for us.
I do find it very interesting that they charged the extra $600. for "trucking fees" exactly the same amount we paid the shipper in Vegas just to get it overseas.Very odd indeed that although we were not charged customs fees as per the law for returning HU citizens, we still had to pay "someone". Of course we know in our hearts the customs agents were abusing their power, maybe they were in kahoots with the warehouse, we will never really know but it was really messed up and not right.Hope they got a good laugh out of it because their karma is going to be pretty heavy if they do that to many people.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

.....very odd indeed that although we were not charged customs fees as per the law for returning HU citizens, we still had to pay "someone". Of course we know in our hearts the customs agents were abusing their power, maybe they were in kahoots with the warehouse, we will never really know but it was really messed up and not right.Hope they got a good laugh out of it because their karma is going to be pretty heavy if they do that to many people.

It's always been the case that Customs is a nice way of earning a bit of cash on the side.  In many countries, competition to be in Customs is intense - just for scamming.

When I received my personal goods way back in the 1990s, I was also not allowed to open the boxes.  However the Customs guy turned up a day later and it was sorted there and then.

And all it cost me was about $200 in cash and bottle of vodka.  The agent I used told me which brand and the size of bottle. I never saw the deal done but maybe the agent kept the vodka and the Customs guy got the $200 or maybe they split it.  But at the end of the day, I got my stuff.

Never again. I was  so mad with that experience and with my immigration experience that in my heart of hearts I can never really feel at home here, they did me in mentally.
Sad because I have some family roots here on my own merit.
One of the big reasons we never fixed up our flat, we never felt like we really belonged here after the way we were treated.
Guess we were't alone but dang it's just not right.

International shipping and customs is why I just sold most everything I could not put into a suitcase state side and rebought here. I am not too fond of "stuff" anyway. And new country, new stuff goes went together. And shopping is fun.

My wife from time to time is sad I did not import my Jeep Cherokee, but I pointed out there are not a lot of places in Europe to go 4-wheeling in any way similar to the American South West (which she enjoyed doing during some visits before I moved to Europe).

klsallee wrote:

International shipping and customs is why I just sold most everything I could not put into a suitcase state side and rebought here. I am not too fond of "stuff" anyway. And new country, new stuff goes went together. And shopping is fun.

My wife from time to time is sad I did not import my Jeep Cherokee, but I pointed out there are not a lot of places in Europe to go 4-wheeling in any way similar to the American South West (which she enjoyed doing during some visits before I moved to Europe).

One of the easiest places I found to off road in my Jeep is Croatia. Surprisingly large country, rugged landscape and very few people.