New Charge Imposed by DHL Express on International Shipments

My problem has recently been the inconsistent customs paperwork by the seller causing the charges to be imposed, handling charges applied and then the whole process for reclaiming of duty. I think I have been unlucky in the competence of the people completing the customs forms.

I think that the commodity codes provided by the UK Government do not help as they indicate two different possible VAT rates and no easy way to differentiate between them for the same commodity code either 5% or 20%.

 

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I have had wins from Nomos and Roma this month - both delivered by DHL. Neither charged anything for Customs fees. In fact I received an email from DHL this morning with this note:

Hilfe
Diese Sendung wurde mit DHL Express erstellt






IMPORTANT: DHL Express does not request payments by cash or any other payment methods via email. Please do not send payment in response to this email.

WICHTIG: DHL Express fordert keine Zahlungen, weder in Bar noch über andere Zahlungsmethoden, per E-Mail an. Bitte lösen sie keine Zahlung als Antwort auf diese E-Mail aus.

What is going on?

 

I've had the same experience with DHL recently on a shipment from Portugal. Rather than an import duty it appears to be an effort to increase revenue for DHL to offset higher expenses of doing business. Fed Ex and UPS also are raising the rates on domestic and international shipments.

 

I (in Ireland) have yesterday been billed for 23% VAT for a couple of coins from Leu - should be 13.5% as that's the rate for antiquities. I've disputed it, but the coins will be held for ransom until it's resolved

Those were sent by normal post - I've asked Roma to send by regular post too as the last thing sent by courier was hit for 23% also. Normal post has usually been ignored by Customs... Naville now ship to EU via Belgium, so just Belgium's 6% import tax to be paid.

It looks like I'll have to stick to EU-based auctioneers!

ATB,
Aidan.

 

This whole thread is just sad to read. With covid, I pretty much stopped buying overseas except for some recent LP vinyls but I had no other way of getting them but from a Netherlands seller. They still took 2 months to arrive.

But reading this makes me glad I have stuck with buying within the U.S. and Canada when it comes to my coins. I miss buying coins from the UK and various other overseas dealers. I've gotten some excellent deals despite the exchange rate.

But the long waits, customs, and now all these higher fees, higher shipping, and worse dollar exchange rate. I will pretty much just stick within my own continent.

 

I believe this is all overblown. From what it seems, orders where the following is true will receive a $50 charge.

1. Shipped via DHL or FedEx
2. Valuation over $2k

Even then, I'm not sure if this is 100%. I can say that since I last experienced this.

• I've received one package valued over $2k not shipped FedEx/DHL and was not charged.
• I've received several packages valued under $2k but shipped FedEx and DHL, and was not charged.

Even if I do get charged $50 for a $2k package, this is roughly a 2.5% fee. Yeah, it makes me grumble, but it's not like "OMG. I can't afford these $2k coins now because of this $50 fee."

 

I'm surprised Amazon hasn't really gotten into the auction business yet, whilst they have invaded almost every e-commerce space. Seeing how much Leu is making with just a handful of employees (and paying probably nice mid-6 figure salaries to their numismatists) one day we may see "Amazon Ancients" using their in-house shipping acumen to whipsaw the competition.

 

I agree if that turns out to be the case, but Roma makes DHL Express the default method of shipping, requiring a specific request before using any other method. Had Roma expressly disclosed the additional $50 charge as part of the cost of shipping (which it effectively is) -- and it appears that the charge may not in fact be new this month* -- I could have had the package shipped by registered mail instead and saved that amount.

*@Kirispupis, it's unclear from what you write whether the recent experiences with DHL shipping that you reference involve orders for which you paid this month, or paid last year. If it's the latter, then your experiences don't actually contradict what Roma told me. Nor, of course, do your experiences with shipping that wasn't made by one of the express courier services.

 

The following are my recent experiences shipping in the spirit of openness. The Roma dates are for the auction. The other dates are when I paid.

11/18/21 - Roma order just over 2000 pounds. Had to pay $50.
12/2/21 - Roma order for ~1400 pounds. No fee charged.
12/4/21 - Order from Netherlands for a few hundred Euros. Shipped FedEx. No fee charged.
12/7/21 - Similar order to above (same seller). Shipped FedEx. No fee charged.
1/4/22 - ~100 Euro order from Austria. Shipped DHL. No fee charged.
1/6/22 - LAC order for a few hundred pounds. Shipped DHL. No fee charged.
(arriving today) - ~2500 CHF order from Leu. Shipped SwissPost. No fee charged.

As you can see, I've had

• An order just under $2k, shipped FedEx from Roma, without fees
• Another order over $2k, but shipped neither FedEx nor DHL, without fees
• Several other orders shipped DHL and FedEx, but under $2k, without fees

The data leads me to the conclusion that one must have >$2k of coins shipped via either FedEx or DHL.

 

I just got hit with a similar fee from Fedex.

Purchased coin from Roma, shipping to Australia, held for ransom in Singapore. Ransom was 10% AUS GST tax payable plus an $88 Fedex handling fee for their trouble.

Coin should arrive in 3 days, it’s been on the bucket list for a while so let’s hope it was all worth it.

 

Was the coin > $2,000?

I've stayed home all day waiting for dhl to deliver my Roma lots now that I've paid the ransom. Still not here, at 5:45 pm. Getting seriously impatient!

 

Does DHL ring your doorbell and leave the shipment next to the door?

In my area, the package is usually left next to the gate, with no announcement of arrival. If I hear the truck or see the bright yellow top of it, I am altered.

 

I live in an apartment building. They press the buzzer for my apartment, I buzz them in, and they come up in the elevator to my apartment.

 

I lived in NYC while attending New School back in 1975. I rented a room in an apartment on Riverside Drive near Grant's Tomb. The building did not have a buzzer system, so anyone could enter the building without permission.

I guess the world was different back then, but there was an assault in the elevator one cold November night. I heard the screaming, jumped out of bed and saw a young guy, wearing only briefs, chasing the assailant down the stairs and out into the street, but without success. I dropped out of New School shortly thereafter.

 

Judging from old movies and personal experience, I think the majority of apartment buildings in NYC had buzzers long before 1975, unless they were fancy buildings with doormen. So even then, I think yours was not the norm. The building I live in now was built in the 1920s, and I'm pretty sure the buzzer system is original.

In any event, it's after 7 pm, and I've never known DHL to arrive this late, so despite claiming since this morning that the package was "out for delivery" today, I'm not expecting it anymore. I can't reschedule it for tomorrow, because I'll be out for a good part of the day with pre-surgical appointments in anticipation of my second eye operation on Monday. Maybe Thursday. For $130, I expect more reliable service!

 

Yep it was greater than $2k.

I’m a bit worried because my last Roma lot was delivered by FedEx but the delivery man dropped it off at my neighbours house and she signed for it as Erika (my real name is Eric).

I was waiting for it and watching it’s progress on the Fedex App. So when I saw that it was delivered and signed for by Erika I immediately drove home and noticed there was no package.

I live in a really good neighbourhood with almost no crime. However, I do have a security system with exterior CCTV cameras. I checked the recording at the delivery time and sure enough the Fedex guy pulls up to my neighbours house, doesn’t even check the address and my neighbour signs for it right on the street. Absolutely insane! I walked straight over to her house and said I want my package that she signed for as Erika, she was visibly embarrassed and brought it to me apologizing saying she thought it was walki-talkies for her boys and doesn’t want me to think she was trying to steal my parcel. Meanwhile the package had a clear description of what it was and who it was for. Some people just have no shame.

 

That's freaky. Our next door neighbors hate us and once when a package was accidentally delivered there (thankfully not a coin), she threw it in the trash.

We get along with our other neighbors, though, and if we're not home when a package is delivered we'll ask them to take it inside and vice versa.

Then of course there was the time my coins were delivered correctly, but then my son thought the package was for him, so he opened it, saw the piece of cardboard and left it on my table. My wife then thought it was trash and threw it out. (related in another post here - and we did rescue them).

 

DHL has been pulling this ransom scam for a couple of years (that I am aware of). Had it happen to my daughter - she ordered some clothes online and paid in full for the item and shipping only to get a text from DHL a week later saying the item was at their warehouse but wouldn't be shipped unless she paid an $18 "customs" fee - we paid it just to end the drama but I think that is what they are banking on. I do not think one penny of that money was due to customs fees.

Here is a CBC article discussing DHL and their ransom fees...
https://www.cbc.ca/news/gopublic/dhl-hidden-fees-1.5935236

 

Much to my surprise, the package was finally delivered about 8 pm (after the "end of the day" as DHL defines it), but I didn't complain. Especially because no further demands for money were made!

I am very pleased with the four coins I received. Because Roma's auction photos of the coins, unless I've recently become color-blind, were in black and white, I will try to take new ones before I post them here. I don't think black-and-white fully captures what they look like. One of the four came in its own separate little box: the Roman Republican denarius of Lucius Memmius, depicting Apollo (probably) on the obverse and the Dioscuri and their horses on the reverse, from the @Andrew McCabe Collection with auction provenances to NAC in 2014 and Aureo y Calico in 2004. (The other three are denarii of Trajan and Hadrian, and a Trajan drachm from Lycia.)

As for DHL's $44.75 charge, it wouldn't surprise me if the company is following the same deceptive practices in the USA as @Clavdivs has described in Canada, and was not being truthful when it told me that I was responsible for "import duty" and that the company had "paid the duty for [my] parcel." Perhaps it made that statement about advancing a supposed "import duty" because its USA website is deliberately opaque about the existence of a service or processing charge imposed by DHL itself on the receiver of merchandise. See DHL's website, in the section entitled "Receiver’s guide to Duties and Taxes" (see https://mydhl.express.dhl/us/en/hel...ce/duties-and-taxes.html#/receiving_shipments), stating only as follows:

"When goods are not shipped domestically (within your country) or within a single customs union, such as the European Union, you are liable to pay any inbound duties and taxes which your local customs authority deems appropriate.

To ensure the DHL courier can deliver your goods in shortest possible time after entering your country or customs union, DHL pays the customs authority on your behalf for any duties and taxes that are due on the goods.

Once the duties and taxes are fully repaid to DHL the goods will be delivered to you."

The only reference to a service charge is hidden in the Shipper’s Guide to Duties and Taxes (https://mydhl.express.dhl/us/en/hel...vice/duties-and-taxes.html#/sending_shipments), which states:

"The payment of duties and taxes are typically the responsibility of the receiver, although DHL Express does offer the opportunity for DHL account holders to pay for them.

In that case, after shipment delivery, DHL invoices customers for the duties and taxes we paid on their behalf at destination, plus a small administration fee." (Emphasis added.)

There's no specification, of course, of just how "small" the fee is.

But if Customs did, in fact, charge DHL an administration or processing fee on my package, and DHL paid it on my behalf in advance (rather than charging me the fee on its own behalf), and simply sought reimbursement from me, I'm not sure I understand the basis for the imposition by Customs of a processing fee. First, as I pointed out in my OP, the USA, through Customs, does not charge any import duty on ancient coins or any other coins made "prior to the 14th century." See Section 9705.00.0001 of the current Harmonized Tariff Schedule ("HTS") of the United States, expressly categorizing that classification as "free" of import duty. And, DHL's own invoice to me admits that the additional charge to me was not an actual import duty (contrary to its cover email), but consisted of fees for "merchandise processing" and "duty tax receiver," not otherwise explained.

Furthermore, even though Customs does charge a "merchandise processing fee" on an ad valorem basis in certain cases, particularly "for imports of commercial goods valued at $2,500 or more" (see the summary of the relevant CFR provisions at https://help.cbp.gov/s/article/Article-334?language=en_US#:~:text=The Merchandise Processing Fee (MPF,than $27.23 For example, if [emphasis added], and the relevant provisions themselves at https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-19/chapter-I/part-24/section-24.23), it doesn't appear to me that Customs should charge any merchandise processing fee at all in the specific case of ancient coins. See https://www.cbp.gov/trade/basic-import-export/internet-purchases ("If any duty is owed, CBP will charge a processing fee for clearing your package") (emphasis added); see also https://www.cbp.gov/trade/priority-issues/trade-agreements/merchandise-processing-feed ("MPF Exemption on Unconditionally Free Goods - CSMS message 09-000292 . The MPF exemption is available to unconditionally free goods even though "Free" is not listed in the "Special" column of the HTSUS [Harmonized Tariff Schedule US]"). As stated above, ancient coins are, in fact, listed as "Free" in the HTS.

So my suspicion is that DHL didn't advance anything to Customs, and is imposing its own "service" or "administration" charges on ancient coins, under the guise of advancing import duty (or merchandise processing fee) charges and taxes supposedly required by Customs on shipments exceeding a certain value.

 

Nonsense add-on fees are all the rage these days in all sorts of circumstances. In keeping with current business trends, a convenience fee of $3.82 will be assessed for each view of this post.