The Croatian Customs office, or why I (sometimes) hate living in Croatia +
A few days ago I received a note from the post office. The note says a package is waiting for me and I have to pay some money to pick it up.
Yes, it was my pre-Christmas (December 16th) order from Threadless which finally arrived.
4 t-shirts, $54.60.
It’s a real bargain, if you ask me, for the designs you get. Even more so with the dollar’s recent decline.However, once the stuff arrived to our loving Customs Office, they decided I have to pay some extra money, since the stuff is getting imported into our lovely country. The fees I had to pay are the following:
| Customs | 38,00 kn |
|---|---|
| Taxes | 68,00 kn |
| VAT (22%) | 23,32 kn |
| Administrative fee | 10,00 kn |
| Customs fee | 10,00 kn |
| Grand Total: | 149,32 kn |
The 149,32 kn is the equivalent of $29,96.
Now, ignoring the fact that I have to pay the equivalent of 2 more brand new t-shirts (just to get the stuff I already payed for), what really pisses me off is the fact that they open up the package, check what’s inside, and then plaster the package back. My gut tells me there’s something wrong with that picture. Not to mention the possibilities for stuff to just mysteriously disappear (it’s been known to happen).
My stuff. That has a customs declaration on it, declaring the package contents. That is already payed for.Why? With all the fancy x-raying technology today, and god knows what kind of scanners the common folk don’t even know exist, they rip apart the package, and muffle through the contents by hand?
Even worse – two of my previous deliveries weren’t affected by this nonsense at all!? And the first one even cost twice as much as the last one!
How? Why? Who the fuck decides and what’s the decision criteria?
Some Customs Officer’s perception of value? The shipping address? My name and/or surname?
Is it really possible that the whole thing simply boils down to how lucky you are and in who’s hands your package ends up? That’s just plain wrong. Even more so now that our beloved country is on the verge of becoming a full fledged member of the European Union.
it also happened to me. also 150kn.
then i called the customs office and the
bitchlady didn’t want to explain me how i why they did that.i told her that i ordered t-shirt from USA, 40$ value (2 tees + shipping) and i wonder how can they charge extra 30$ for nothing…
the only thing i found out is that the whole procedure costs around 150kn, no matter what was in your order.
they also opened mine.
i also talked to some people who know some people and they said that things go pretty much like you described in your last paragraph – the whole thing simply boils down to how lucky you are and in who’s hands your package ends up.
sad but true…
p.s. maybe they log every order and if you hit some limit they decide to rip you off… because i ordered x times before (cca. 5 t-shirts per package) and they never charged me… and after that i had three or four more orders and they didn’t charge… maybe they’ll charge my next order… well… who knows…
p.p.s. try to ship to some other members of your household next time (just in case they track name + address + package type)
Yeah, the situation is utter crap. Was thinking about getting some extra car parts from ebay, but I’m not so sure it’s a good idea right now…
BTW, how much would that order logging system suck if just shipping to another household member would throw it off? :))
well, technically that’s another person… they can’t blame your brother if he bought t-shirts after you bought tons of t-shirts before him… or can they? :)
I’ve bought 3 t-shirts on mozilla.com for my last year dont-use-ie promotion, and the same thing happened to me.. it cost me almost the same money that I’ve payed for t-shirts.. one word, horror :(
That’s why people are swarming into the U.S. embassy and trying to get a chance to visit Lady Liberty in New York.