When buying goods online that are coming from overseas, it’s usually the case that the purchase price you see on your screen, isn’t the final amount of money you’ll end up paying. That’s because your purchases are subject to import taxes and customs duty, which are applied to these items based on a number of factors.
This includes where in the world your purchases are coming from, and in what category the items are classified as. An import duty calculator helps you get to the bottom of these finer details quickly and easily. It allows you to work out exactly what you can expect to pay on various import taxes and duties including excise duty and VAT.

Using an import duty calculator to work out your real purchase price

It’s always nice to know exactly what you’re going to end up paying for something up front. Online shopping for goods coming from overseas can often lure some people into a false sense of security — by presenting them with a purchase price that’s well below what they’ll actually end up spending.

By using an import duty calculator, you’ll be able to stay ahead of the game with immediate access to calculations on what additional duty and VAT you’ll be paying in the long run.

It’s important to remember that some courier services charge an extra fee, while in other cases the company handling your delivery will charge you the exact UK duty and VAT as part of their service. Either way, they’ll contact you to confirm custom clearance and notify you how much you owe and how to pay for it.

Evenso, it’s a good idea to understand what these charges are likely to be before you get invoiced. Whether you’re purchasing from Alibaba and other eCommerce marketplaces, an import duty calculator is a helpful tool that gives you a better idea of this sum earlier on. That means you’ll be able to have funds in place to cover your extra cost as and when you need it.

Why it’s a good time to have an import duty calculator to hand

Now’s the time of year when you might be doing a little more online shopping than usual. The run up to Christmas usually sees a large spike in online shopping — including gift shopping from overseas vendors. That means people might end up paying a lot more than they might initially realise as those special stocking fillers get checked off their Christmas shopping list. In fact, Angela Shephard, the Head of Customs Policy at HMRC, has already warned shoppers not to get caught out by ‘unexpected charges when you are shopping for Christmas bargains this year’.
As the cost of living crisis continues to bite, many of us have needed to keep a closer eye on our outgoings and general expenditure — and have needed to be more attentive to our household budgeting. This in turn has put an even greater squeeze on our Christmas shopping budget.
With this in mind, there are plenty of things you can do this festive season to keep your costs to a minimum — from using Google Shopping to find the best online deals to keeping unnecessary gifting struck off your shopping list.
Making a shopping list and sticking to it is a good idea. It means you can cut down on impulsive spending and helps you stick to what you can actually afford.
And, by maintaining your list with the aid of an import duty calculator, you’ll also be able to use it to keep track of those extra import costs on gifts from overseas that you’ll end up paying after the initial purchase.
Using an import duty calculator means you can sum up all this expense as you go thanks to a simple online form that takes less than 60 seconds to use.

How does an import duty calculator actually work?

The amount of import duty you will pay on your shipping depends on the value and type of goods being imported. Items are subject to a process of classification that designates them a product category — enabling an import duty calculator to apply the appropriate duty percentage rate. For this reason it’s a good idea to have a good understanding of your item’s description to ascertain the correct tariff code.

These tariff codes are often referred to as ‘customs harmonised tariff system codes, or HS Codes for short. Whenever any goods are imported to the UK, these codes come into play to calculate duty percentages on shipping items. With these in hand an import duty calculator will make short work of summarising the correct UK duty you’ll finally end up paying.

As well as UK duty, you’ll also need to pay some VAT. People often make the mistake in thinking that VAT is already calculated based on just the purchase price of the goods alone — only to find out later that it is in fact based upon the TOTAL cost including purchase price, shipping cost and duty.

You can try out our handy import duty calculator right here. In fact, you may want to bookmark it for future reference. So, whenever you’re about to make an online purchase from overseas you’ll be able to find out the real cost before you hit ‘buy it now’.

Simply enter the purchase price, the item’s description and courier responsible for handling it — and then click ‘Enter’. It’s that simple.

Go to import duty calculator