Comment by jgrahamc | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jgrahamc | Hacker News Reader

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I have done my part in this slow down I imagine: ordering anything from the UK for delivery into the EU is a nightmare. Everything takes forever and smaller businesses simply don't deal with the paperwork meaning you're left with a mess at local customs. The result is dealing with local bureaucracy and paying high import duties (or in some cases simply seeing the thing you bought get returned to the UK).

Because it became such a mess I simply gave up.

For example, I used to buy Elemis brand products. They still sell in Euros but here's what it says on their website: "Please note, orders that are shipping outside of the UK will not be charged UK sales tax but maybe subject to customs charges and tax that will need to be paid directly. This affects orders placed both in £ and in Euro. We advise you to please check requirements with the local authority before placing your order." (https://eu.elemis.com/delivery)

Ordering from the UK is the same as ordering from the US or China. Which is ridiculous given the physical proximity. Great job poking yourself in the eye, Britain!

And, worse, there are businesses that have figured out the customs/tax situation and will ship directly to Europe with no problem, but now I'm gun-shy and figure it'll be a mess so I go look elsewhere.

Absolutely. Apparently, the amount of trade between Ireland and the UK has collapsed since Brexit, and it's not hard to imagine why — given that both countries have long been close trading partners, and now ordering from the UK is going to come with a raft of customs charges and often VAT etc. Doesn't even matter if it's some second hand item from eBay or whatever.

This pretty much rules out buying anything from the UK for me, something I and many others I know would have done without much thought. It's really frustrating because you'll often find UK vendors are better stocked and have (or at least had) better prices.

I can only imagine this has hit UK based sellers pretty hard. And vice versa — perhaps more so. Brexit is a poke in Ireland's eye too, frankly.

> Ordering from the UK is the same as ordering from the US or China

is it hard to order from the US or China where you're from? i'm asking because i usually order from those places along with australia, and haven't noticed any issues.

I suspect a lot of it is due to UK customs regulations. In the US importing items under $800 is tax free once person per day (of course this does harm US businesses) [0]. In the UK the foreign seller has to register for, collect, and remit VAT (similar to sales tax) as well as deal with duties above 135 GBP [1].

[0] https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/national-media-release/de-minim... [1] https://www.avalara.com/vatlive/en/vat-news/uk-post-brexit-v...

It depends on the business. If they deal with the import formalities it's trivial, if they don't it's not. My point was that prior to Brexit the UK was part of the EU which made this entirely irrelevant. Now it's something I have to think about.

I've largely managed to find EU alternatives that pay import duty for most of the things I used to buy from the UK.

For example, Feel Unique are pretty good for cosmetics:

https://eu.feelunique.com/brands/elemis?q=ELEMIS

https://eu.feelunique.com/help-centre/Feelunique+Order/Feelu...

Thanks for that. Now imagine the cost of that for the brand. I used to order direct and now I would have to go through a third party who is going to take their cut.

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