Importing from South Africa.

[Skyedriver]

Import from the EU, purchases are subject to import taxes, what on costs are involved in bringing an older car in from South Africa? Car about £3500 plus shipping.
Thanks in advance.

[Bigus]

Don’t discount corruption and your container arriving home empty or the car denuded at best , close contacts are required locally and these cost money too. Don’t ask how I know !

[Skyedriver]

Thanks, all appears genuine as far as the seller is concerned but as you say there's a lot could go wrong once in a container etc.
Just don't want to press the button on a price only to be hammered with tax bills of another 25% or whatever.

[crankedup]

Be ultra cautious, I was so very nearly scammed a couple of years ago when I was on the verge of buying a used vehicle from S.A. Just before pinging over money I did one more exhaustive check on the business I was dealing with and noticed a numerical error between a couple of the papers they had emailed over to me. Digging deep I found the business park they operated from and ‘their’
unit was let to a business with a almost identical name.
Some more deep checking showed up a clever scam. I dodged an expensive error, everything was so convincing and it was only one tiny detail that revealed the scam.
Please do be ultra cautious.

[J1990]

I know people talk about swallowing the brave pill when they buy cars like the C6 RS6 with that Lambo V-10 or other vehicles which can easily throw up bills equivalent to the car itself.
I think buying anything of value from S.A without having solid contacts there and some form of comprehensive insurance for things that could go wrong definitely qualifies as brave pill material. Unless it's something truly unique or the 3.5k isn't a material amount of money for you I'd be saving the headache based on the risk factor alone.

[andrewcliffe]

If the car is over 30 years old it could possibly enter as a collectible item where it attracts 0% duty and 5% VAT. Plus customers clearance and dock charges.

Have seen a lot of South African classic cars and with few exceptions have been disappointed.

[Skyedriver]

Thanks, still waiting for addition photos from the seller - going to accept your advice above and give it a miss.

[crankedup]

^^^^^
Wise.

[samoht]

Notwithstanding the sensible advice above, to answer the original question on costs a personal import from Japan attracts import duty at 10% and then VAT at 20% on top of that (so total tax is 32% of the delivered value of the car), I'm not aware of any reason South Africa would be different.