Bitcoin Forum

Ordered about $40,000 worth of mining equipment from Halong and DHL is stating I have to pay more than $1,200 in import duty taxes and fees! Is this right? I had no idea it would be this much. I live near the customs office, should I try to clear it myself? I’m in the USA.

If you live near the customs office then yes go and try to clear it yourself, but that would only take care of the fee DHL charges to operate as your broker.

You will still have to pay whatever the Duty and taxes are for importing to your state. Regardless that seems reasonable on a $40 000 order; it's 3% of the value.

Lol in my country you would pay over 10k for import taxes. So consider yourself lucky :)

Yeah, that is a bit high, but not out of range.  Its one of the reasons I use Fed-Ex, their custom fees are lower than UPS or DHL.

US Customs has decided to reclassify bitcoin hardware. They recently sent me a six figure retroactive bill saying the good had been mis-classified under the old Automated Data Processing number.

I wouldnt be surprised if you are just being hit with the new duty schedule. They actually told us the new classification is similar to what vaping products are classified as, its pretty ridiculous.

Got a link to their new schedule?
Considering miners are hard-core computing devices and the only 'microprocessor' in vape pens is for monitoring the Li battery in them, how in Gods's name does CBP think they are related?

Thats what we have been fighting with for the last 2 weeks since they dropped the bomb on us. There is no logic to what they are claiming the reclassification is and we cannot get anyone to give us a true solid answer on it. Ill update as I find more information out.

Even how hard i do think about their similar classification i cant really believe that a miner would really be just the same with vapes? seriously?

Regarding with $1200 tax i do see its reasonable, of that happen into my country then expect i would be charge more than with that amount.

This is pretty normal considering you're exporting hardware from another country.I'm actually surprised you're paying way less than what they usually charge on import duties.If I were to order them in my country,I'd easily end up paying $10k or more for a hardware product worth $40k.It has nothing to do with how far you live from the customers office.Import taxes are charged for clearing the goods from one country to another.

Same situation on my country knowing that this place is imposing huge custom tax when it comes to orders being done on other countries and as Joel said i would rather be charged for as much of $10k with that kind of purchase.I dont know why they do have huge charge up on tax but you dont have any choice but to pay it if you dont like for your items to be pending.

It's less than 5% and yet you are complaining? Where I live customs duties vary from 10 to 40 percent, now that's what I call a legal robbery.

The import duty is usually like 30-40% on the net value of the items when you buy something related to technology. If you buy anything other than that,it varies from 12-15% max,for most countries I guess.
For technology,there is first import duty(varies from 5-15%),then fee charged by the customs officer(it depends on how much he wants to charge) and finally add up the whole sum,charge the VAT for that amount,and you have to pay that whole amount.
All in all,it rounds up to 30-40%.

What? 30-40% fees on technic? Where do you live?
That's a lot high, it makes almost impossible to have wish of buying some techs from another country.
There are only 18% fee on imported items where I live. OP you could to try ordering on tax free zone which is near to you (it may cause problems for you and receiver, depends on situation). I guess now you can't do anything to change fees if not worsen. Btw go in customs office, you lose nothing.

Yeah for some products, I pay more on import/custom fee than the original product. Sometimes I pay lesser than the 40% and sometimes I pay like 40-60% also. This varies every single time but yeah it is what it is.
If you're buying from Amazon, you can apparently ask them to waive the fee after you place your order, they don't do it always but I did hear someone saying that they waived the fees for the person who had ordered. So guess will have to try that out.
But still 18% fee is no joke.

Of course no joke, that's pretty high especially for country with bad economics. Yeah, I remember now, one man who is from greece also told me that he payed 30-40% fee on item ordered from US.
What I want to know is following: Do you have to pay that percent after item's value will be higher than 500$ (for example) or you have to pay 30-40% in any way even if item worths 20$?

Didnt Trump order an increase in tariffs on products made in China? ReadyPlayer1, you should double check that with customs.

Its also a great idea to pay the fees immediately and start mining as soon as possible before the difficulty goes up fast. Bitcoin has already hit its floor and might start growing again.

Wait, did his increase in tariffs effective immediately?
I thought there are adjustment period for a few weeks/months before the tariffs got increased.

Ouch, that sounds like a real nightmare.
At that point I would just refund the item back to seller unless its not sold on your country and has to be imported.
I know some sellers that can under-value an item, basically he will write lower price on invoice than the actual price.
With this sometimes you don't have to pay enormous tax at all.

Are you serious that you have to pay 25%? It is so high IMO, indeed 1,2k is still low compared to what I have pay here in my country as from $40,000 then I will need to pay at least $4k (10%).
OP: if you think it is too high, you should check the official rules/laws about import/export of your local government.

Yes I am dead serious. On approx 12k $ of equipment I paid approx 3,5k $ for taxes.
I dont need to check I already know that and that is how it is around here.
Mining equipment is considered as computer equipment so we "only" need to pay VAT, if it was something else we would have to pay approx 10% more for customs charges.
It is a ripoff...

If I buy anything from Amazon, the tax varies and it is very much weird to figure out how they calculate the tax. I'll show some images from Amazon so that you can see for yourself.
https://i.imgur.com/PSYENWN.jpg

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https://i.imgur.com/S6H65wG.jpg

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https://i.imgur.com/ufPJmAg.jpg

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However if I directly import goods not from Amazon, then I believe the percentage is atleast 20%,after all those rich bastards won't let me live until they took their share of money from me in the name of import duty.

That particular point is not the worst. Trust me. Even after me paying these taxes I find that product comparatively cheaper than what I get in my country. For example, if I buy something from outside my country for 1000$,pay 200$ for tax, it'd amount to 1200$,and for the same product in my country I'd have to pay like 2000$ without adding VAT.
Exactly, but this case happens very rarely so good luck with anybody waiving their taxes off.

I doubt if there is anything much you can do because most of the fees have been stated. Over here for example, if you want to import a vehicle even if the value is 90$ from where its coming from, you will.have to pay 40% of the market value of the vehicle as import duty even if you live in the custom office. Here, I think the import duty is not on the value but the type and category of equipment you are bringing in which is why its on the high side but nothing is stopping you from explaining things if it won't cost you anything.

I'm not sure but I would guess that electronic items from China would be the first ones to have its tarrifs increased because they enter the US by bulk.

Look! BTC is starting to go up and be bullish again. ReadyPlayer1, hurry up lol.

This.

And they call it "value added tax" as if any value was added by extorting money from the buyer  >:(