Photography Thailand Forum

[celtasia]

Hi, anyone had experiences buying camera equipment from ebay and getting it shipped to Thailand?
Are there problems with customs etc ...any Thai based photographers tried this?

[hughden]

I bought a filter via E-bay and it arrived without attracting the attention of customs. I expect, like any shipment, once it goes above a certain value it will be intercepted and you will have to pay some duty. If I buy one DVD from Amazon for example, it arrives direct. If I buy four at once then I have to go down to the post office and pay some duty.
There are some attractively priced items out of Hong Kong on E-bay, very tempting!

[jerry]

It will be interesting to see what customs charge

[gregoire]

I've ordered a camera on ebay and had it delivered here and was charged:

5% customs + 7% VAT

[Chris Savery]

I've bought filter caps, extension tubes, batteries and small stuff off ebay. I wasn't charged duty on those.
I also bought a light tent from China without duty.
I bought my 20D and my 24-70L/2.8 off of fredmiranda.com and had them shipped here by priority mail from the US and wasn't charged duty either. For the big items they were not from a dealer so I asked them to mark actual value for insurance purposes and the words "personal property, return for repair" and that seems to have helped. Maybe I was lucky.
Chris :)

[gregoire]

I should add that even though I bought it through ebay, the product was offered by adorama.com.  Most North American companies (and even many individuals) refuse to mark anything but the truth on their shipments' customs declaration and even specify this in their fine print. On the other hand, companies in Hong Kong advertise that they will gladly mark the shipment as a "gift" or anything that pleases you (but hold no responsibility over whether that will trick customs or not). In short, Chris's "personal property, return for repair" trick sounds good, but you need to find someone who will accept to mark that on the item's customs declaration.

[PeterP]

I have bought a few things but have always used my address in England (the same as my Credit Card). My parents then send them on to me here - the one nearly new, boxed etc I got my parents to unpack and not to send the box. No duty. I'm interested to know how you pay and get suppliers to supply direct - most seem to explicitly say they won't ship to Thailand. Also few like Credit Cards from Thailand.  Or am I wrong?

[celtasia]

never had things posted to Thailand, but some members seem to have done it.

[Chris Savery]

Sellers that will ship here are hit and miss. A lot of US eBay sellers won't ship outside the USA but those who state worldwide usually don't have a problem with Thailand. The postal service here is quite good. In over 4000 packages sent out of Thailand only a couple have not arrived. I've only had a few items shipped in to Thailand - perhaps around 6 or 8 total and not had any trouble. I am almost sure that there is more trouble in the US end than in the Thai end. From USA the best method is Global Priority Mail but check usps.com for other methods. There is an EMS equivalent as well that has better tracking with signature required but I forget offhand right now about the details.

As for payment I have always used Paypal. It's easy to open an account there and fund it with a credit card or bank account (not from Thailand though, it's best to get this all set up before you come here), and sellers generally are a bit less picky with Paypal than with a credit card directly - though again, some will demand that it only go to the address on file. Paypal does allow multiple addresses (though I've never used that feature).

Hope that all helps a bit,
Chris :)

[antonie]

If you do buy things from abroad over the internet it is "safer" to use a residential address for delivery than a work address.  My experience is that as soon as you use a work address they think it is for a company and the duties seem to increase??