Processing International Orders

[palmpal]

Hello,

I live in the US and recently had an inquiry from someone living in New Zealand. I'd like to process the order but wonder how processing International Sales works. I quoted the price of the order in US Dollars and added my cost for shipping Global Express. Are there any other hidden expenses? The total order including shipping is about $27.00. Thanks for any help!

[Essex_boy]

They may have to pay import tax at the other end, make sure they are aware of that.

[lgn1]

Here is middle's earth official customs site.

[customs.govt.nz ]

They claim that no duty or taxes are collected if the customs charges on the goods is less than $50. Sounds like a good deal to me.

[babushka99]

You would also have to attach a Commercial Invoice with the outgoing shipment. Your courier company should be able to provide you with that (a copy). It has information about the contents, value, customs declaration, etc.

[antirack]

Depending on what products you export, you might need some special form filled in from your customer. For instance this applies to electronic components, or stuff that contains encryption (software, firewalls, etc).

Slightly off topic, but aren't you required by law anyway to include an invoice when you ship to your customers, even inside the USA?

If you don't include an invoice in Germany, you will get handcuffed and locked up, or the tax office will investigate you for years and you are required to pay your taxes in advance in the future (if they don't give you some sort of penalty anyway). And the customer will for sure call the better business office for "ripping him off" and not including an invoice.

[lgn1]

We don't include an invoice. We include a packing slip. The customer got their invoice when they placed the web order. Some times the customer orders an item for a gift, and they don't want the receiving party finding out, how much they shelled out.

Besides the invoice contains to much information for customs. We prefer to generalize our merchandise for customs purposes. What has worked for us, is the less specific you are with customs, the less hassle you will have.