Royal Mail "handling fee"

Author
Discussion

Getragdogleg

Original Poster:

8,736 posts

182 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
What is the legal mechanism that allows the Royal Mail to add an £8 Handling fee to a small parcel that arrived from the US ?

It had a £2.00 customs fee but the Royal Mail fee put the total over the value of the goods.

I did not enter into a contract with Royal mail when I bought the item from the seller in the US but he sent it USPS so it got handed to the Royal Mail.

They didn't even deliver it ! I had to collect and pay after they sent me a little note with the demand for money !

mph1977

12,467 posts

167 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
yet another thread on this

see innumerable other such threads with full and complete descriptions of the process ...

paintman

7,669 posts

189 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
http://ask.ofcom.org.uk/help/post/mailhandling
"Post
Why do I have to pay a handling charge on items I ordered from outside the UK?
If you order goods worth £15 or more from outside the EU and you have not paid the Import VAT in advance, you will have to pay Import VAT on these goods when they arrive in the UK.

If the goods are worth more than £105, customs duty is also payable.
However, whichever UK postal operator delivers your goods will pay these customs charges and will then charge you both the customs charges and a handling fee before you can claim your goods from them.

For example, Royal Mail charges an £8 handling fee on top of the customs charges owed. See Royal Mail's website for more information regarding customs charges on items ordered from abroad."

Getragdogleg

Original Poster:

8,736 posts

182 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
mph1977 said:
yet another thread on this

see innumerable other such threads with full and complete descriptions of the process ...
Why don't we just make all the boards read only and make them a searchable archive then ?

Oh, that's right, its a discussion board.

You took the effort to post but there was no actual content, happy ?



Getragdogleg

Original Poster:

8,736 posts

182 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
paintman said:
http://ask.ofcom.org.uk/help/post/mailhandling
"Post
Why do I have to pay a handling charge on items I ordered from outside the UK?
If you order goods worth £15 or more from outside the EU and you have not paid the Import VAT in advance, you will have to pay Import VAT on these goods when they arrive in the UK.

If the goods are worth more than £105, customs duty is also payable.
However, whichever UK postal operator delivers your goods will pay these customs charges and will then charge you both the customs charges and a handling fee before you can claim your goods from them.

For example, Royal Mail charges an £8 handling fee on top of the customs charges owed. See Royal Mail's website for more information regarding customs charges on items ordered from abroad."
Thanks, it seems unfair to be hit with a charge of £8 (+ the vat) for a £15 item but hey, life aint fair !

Rude-boy

22,227 posts

232 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
Getragdogleg said:
Thanks, it seems unfair to be hit with a charge of £8 (+ the vat) for a £15 item but hey, life aint fair !
On the other hand now you know to drop them an e-mail to see if they will accept £14.99 wink

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
Getragdogleg said:
Thanks, it seems unfair to be hit with a charge of £8 (+ the vat) for a £15 item but hey, life aint fair !
It would be unfair if it wasn't clear and transparent how the charge would be levied, so you couldn't take it into account before ordering something from outside the EU.

Rude-boy

22,227 posts

232 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
PH Top Tip - Buy some shares in Royal Mail. Since doing this I have found myself strangely less wound up by being charged £1 when a letter is missing 1p of postage or some monkey has decided it doesn't fit through 'their' size gage when it did fit through the Perspex one they RM gave work.

BrettMRC

4,033 posts

159 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
This 'fee' is a load of tosh and there is no standardisation in it's application.

Sent out 50+ wedding invites, all the same size and approximately 50% were stopped by RM as being oversized?!?

So.... £0.10 additional postage and a £1 handling fee.

I could understand if they had all been deemed too large....

WTF?

TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
BrettMRC said:
Sent out 50+ wedding invites, all the same size and approximately 50% were stopped by RM as being oversized?!?
Were they...? How close to the limit when you checked them before sending?

BrettMRC said:
So.... £0.10 additional postage and a £1 handling fee.

I could understand if they had all been deemed too large....

WTF?
You were lucky with half...

Devil2575

13,400 posts

187 months

Friday 3rd July 2015
quotequote all
BrettMRC said:
This 'fee' is a load of tosh and there is no standardisation in it's application.

Sent out 50+ wedding invites, all the same size and approximately 50% were stopped by RM as being oversized?!?

So.... £0.10 additional postage and a £1 handling fee.

I could understand if they had all been deemed too large....

WTF?
I think the problem is that not all Royal Mail employees agree with the offical approach so let some letters through that they shouldn't really.

I could be wrong though.

GC8

19,910 posts

189 months

Saturday 4th July 2015
quotequote all
Getragdogleg said:
What is the legal mechanism that allows the Royal Mail to add an £8 Handling fee to a small parcel that arrived from the US ?

It had a £2.00 customs fee but the Royal Mail fee put the total over the value of the goods.

I did not enter into a contract with Royal mail when I bought the item from the seller in the US but he sent it USPS so it got handed to the Royal Mail.

They didn't even deliver it ! I had to collect and pay after they sent me a little note with the demand for money !
They have acted as your customs agent, cleared it and paid HMC&E upfront on your behalf.

It stings a little, I understand, but as a seasoned imported I can assure you that their service represents brilliant value for money. You wont find a customs agent for less than £35 and you could pay 10x that.

davepoth

29,395 posts

198 months

Saturday 4th July 2015
quotequote all
GC8 said:
They have acted as your customs agent, cleared it and paid HMC&E upfront on your behalf.

It stings a little, I understand, but as a seasoned imported I can assure you that their service represents brilliant value for money. You wont find a customs agent for less than £35 and you could pay 10x that.
+1. It's a similar amount of paperwork regardless of whether it's twenty or twenty thousand pounds, so this is a great deal.

soad

32,825 posts

175 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
Been stung twice myself (purchased watches from the USA).

Pretty sure ParcelForce charged/s even more?

velocefica

4,636 posts

107 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
The idea is that Royal Mail collect the custom charge ( money making racket) on behalf of HMRC and pass it on.

Royal Mail won't negotiate at all even if you've been wrongly charged the custom fee plus the so called handling charge.

Just have to be very careful when buying from outside the EU.

I bought an item for £300 from EbAY US, got stung £75 custom fee. New in the UK the item was well over £1k so wasn't too bad.

For something that costs £5 and you get stung it's a pain in the arse.

Twilkes

478 posts

138 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
velocefica said:
The idea is that Royal Mail collect the custom charge ( money making racket) on behalf of HMRC and pass it on.

...

Just have to be very careful when buying from outside the EU.
Is this to do with trade tariffs etc, or something different?

What's the deal that means we don't have to pay customs charges within the EU?

anonymous-user

53 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
The EU is a customs union, and goods that have originated within or been imported to any EU member state can then circulate without customs charges within the EU. The EU operates tariff barriers against non EU goods. Nowadays the EU is submerged in political arguments about democracy, over reach, migration, you name it, but its origins as a trading club are still relevant.

The Royal Mail's legal basis for charging may exist in some item of legislation that I CBA to research, but even if it does not the charge could be based on the common law principle whereby a party that provides a service to another party can make a charge for it, even absent a contract. This is part of the area of law called the law of restitution. If anyone fancies some Latin, they can say quantum meruit ("what is earned"). In theory, you could say the charge is more than the service warrants, but do you want to litigate over two quid? (This being PH, the answer to that will probably be yes!)

dxg

8,120 posts

259 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
soad said:
Been stung twice myself (purchased watches from the USA).

Pretty sure ParcelForce charged/s even more?
It was £13.50 last time for me. Annoying, as I'd factored in VAT and an £8 handling fee, so it was a surprise to have my parcel held hostage for another £5.50.


TooMany2cvs

29,008 posts

125 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
Twilkes said:
What's the deal that means we don't have to pay customs charges within the EU?
Free movement of goods. One of the fundamental tenets, along with free movement of capital and free movement of people. Always has been, since it was first started in the '50s, before we joined in the '70s.

Buy something within the EU, you pay EU VAT on it. You pay it where you bought it.
Buy something from outside the EU, you don't pay EU VAT on it. You pay it when you import it.

There may or may not be duty on goods you import, too, depending on what they are.

The Mad Monk

10,474 posts

116 months

Sunday 5th July 2015
quotequote all
Getragdogleg said:
What is the legal mechanism that allows the Royal Mail to add an £8 Handling fee to a small parcel that arrived from the US ?

It had a £2.00 customs fee but the Royal Mail fee put the total over the value of the goods.

I did not enter into a contract with Royal mail when I bought the item from the seller in the US but he sent it USPS so it got handed to the Royal Mail.

They didn't even deliver it ! I had to collect and pay after they sent me a little note with the demand for money !
You didn't have to pay.

Refuse to pay.

Say to them "No, I am not going to pay" (You can vary the words to suit your personal circumstances, if you wish).