Shipping Flat-Pack furniture

[Jon&Candy]

Does anybody know if it's OK to ship flat-pack furniture?

At the moment, we have a mish-mash of cheap and nasty furniture storing our CDs, DVDs and books. We don't want to bring any of this with us, but we will need some storage.

I was hoping to buy some matching flat-pack bookshelfs from Ikea or somewhere similar in the UK and ship it unassembled, as we're bound to have some spare space in our container.

Would MAF allow this, and would they be liable for import duty?

[zardell]

Would MAF allow this, and would they be liable for import duty?

Quick answer...yes it's allowed, no you would not be liable for import duty.

Tried to find the link I once had for MAF relating to this , but I must have deleted it.

Julie

xx

[jess]

As I understand it if you ship it unassembled you will be liable for duty to Customs. It is allowed, and even with duty would cost you less than buying here. Save your receipts to show the value.

If you can take it out of the box and assemble it before it goes in the container, you will not owe duty to Customs, because anything that's been used is exempt. Even if it's only been used once.

We used a brand new lawnmower once and owed customs nothing for it. Brought a weight bench over in the box (couldn't face assembling at the last minute) and were billed about $50 from customs for it.

See the Customs page for details. It says your items are exempt if among other things, "you have owned and used the goods before the date of your departure for New Zealand."

[barryp]

That's correct. Unassembled furniture would be dutiable and subject to VAT.

We brought over two IKEA bookcases, but equivalent items here would have cost about the same amount. Many, many personal furnishings are really expensive in NZ, but mid-grade furniture isn't, IMO.

[zardell]

As I understand it if you ship it unassembled you will be liable for taxes to Customs. It is allowed, and even with taxes would cost you less than buying here. Save your receipts to show the value.

If you can take it out of the box and assemble it before it goes in the container, you will not owe taxes to Customs, because anything that's been used is exempt. Even if it's only been used once.

We used a brand new lawnmower once and owed customs nothign for it. Brought a weight bench over in the box (couldn't face assembling at the last minute) and were billed about $50 from customs for it.

See the Customs page for details.

Fair comment, although that's not what happened when we shipped 'unopened/unassembled' household effects, although I'm happy to be corrected - maybe we slipped through the net !..............Mmmm

In relation to this issue,I can't see that shipping from UK should be different than shipping from US, can you?

Jon&Candy - maybe StevieD will read this at some point - I believe he brought half of Ikea in his container......LOL

Rambling now, probably loosing it thinking that maybe MAF have me on their most wanted list..........

Julie

xx

[zardell]

That's correct. Unassembled furniture would be dutiable and subject to VAT.

We brought over two IKEA bookcases, but equivalent items here would have cost about the same amount. Many, many personal furnishings are really expensive in NZ, but mid-grade furniture isn't, IMO.

Ooops - I must learn to type quicker.

Julie

xx

[jess]

Hi Julie - It was Customs that billed me, not MAF. The shippers gave me forms in NZ to fill out before my container arrived. The Customs form asked me if I had anything new and never used -- and I put down the weight bench and attached the receipt for it. Customs then billed me a %. Maybe your shipper didn't give you that form or the shipper didn't get it back to Customs... Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, right?

(MAF does keep an eye out to notify customs of duty issues though. When the MAF guy looked at my lawnmower, looking so new, he said, "So you did use this?" and "How many times?" I told him the once. He said that was enough that he didn't need to contact Customs about it.)

[nippa&pippa]

We brought brand new washing machine, we remove the cover and used it once to check it is work and then ask packer rewrap with their package cover! We also slip the net!

Ask packer to cover the boxes of your new items with their package sheet, so they didn't know about 'new' products!

[willowshouse]

We brought over flat-pack beds (which had been used) amongst other things. It really is up to you to be honest about whether they are new/unused or not .. nobody has a chance of seeing whether they are or not because your shippers wrap EVERYTHING in brown paper which you have to remove!

Dawn