8951

Meanwhile, I wanted to buy fancy new bedside radio alarm clock.

https://support.pure.com/en/news/posts/delivery-to-the-uk

The cheaper oranges Jacob Rees Mogg promised have yet to arrive.

8952

So I did some digging on this. There is no handling charge charged by HMRC for this kind of consignment as far as I can tell - or if there is it is small. The courier will charge a charge for the paperwork, but this should be less than £10. There will of course be a VAT charge of 20%, but Pure should give you the zero-rated VAT price, so that comes out in the wash.

Since Pure radios are made in China I thought this was a rules of origin thing, but as far as I can tell clock radios are zero-rated WTO tariff, so this isn’t it. (And they will know the WTO customs codes, as they needed them to import the radios into the EU in the first place).

I think they are either not filling in the declaration correctly or more likely they are double dipping on the VAT but they think it’s a handling charge because they are confused. Or their shipper might just be ripping them/their customers off.

Just as we were talking about above about direct sales to the the EU no longer being as practical, the same applies here - the easiest route is to buy from a British distributor. Since Pure is a big brand I’d be surprised if you can’t get what you want, or if there’s a substantial difference in price (Forex fluctuations notwithstanding).

So:

  1. It’s not a “handling charge”, and
  2. You can still get your clock radio - hopefully.
8953

Hopefully! But all this ‘grit’ is a real friction for trade. I expect eventually things will be resolved (as you say, it’s a bib brand) but eventually with the additional costs passed on to consumers.

8954

Indeed! The single market is a triumph. Leaving it has very real significant economic costs - to both UK and EU.

But it is probably not a big deal to the average person trying to buy stuff.

8955

Well that sucks. Not entirely surprised.

8956

I’m going to continue posting real life frictions I encounter from Brexit, because so much so far has been speculative.

The latest Root Kickstarter has the following:

For our UK friends: At this time the UK has not provided a mechanism that will allow this type of pre-payment for crowdfunded projects fulfilling after June 2021. We are working with our VAT agency to find a solution, but at this time there is not one available. It is likely that by the time we’re making plans for fulfillment there will not be additional VAT, but we cannot promise this with the ongoing legislation changes. We are keeping a close eye on developments, and will provide updates as we are able during the campaign and leading up to fulfillment. We assure you we wish Brexit had less effect, but alas here we are.

Hopefully it is sorted. In the meantime, disruption continues.

8957

Not directly but that’s not really the problem. I went through a similar thing buying a PRUSA 3D printer but they’ve now resolved their issues.

From a consumer point of view, the friction is never that bad. Before buying from other countries became standard I was buying clothes, electronics and R1 DVD’s. It was easy enough to work out tariffs and costs. The biggest problem was persuading the retailer to ship. That’s the fraction we can deal with.

The damaging friction is around whether it easier not to have EU customers not taking UK suppliers and getting somebody from elsewhere in the single market.

The single market was basically exports and imports with training wheels. Open a website and sell to an additional 450 million consumers without extra paperwork. Anybody can do it so easily. Suddenly you’re an international company.

There’s then nothing to stop getting interested in customs paperwork and selling to the rest of the world. Brexit makes the hurdle to selling internationally far higher.

Ian Duncan Smith recently said:
“I just wish I was 21 again, frankly, because my goodness what prospects lie ahead of us for young people now. To be out there buccaneering, trading, dominating the world again…”

There was nothing stopping him from doing that then, particularly as we joined the Common Market when he was 21.

A Curious Tangent
I must admit that I chose the quote because I think it’s a stupid quote. I thought I check out his career to see what entrepreneurial chutzpah he had at 21.

I’m a bit of an Army brat so I spent my teenage years hanging around an officers’ mess. I also looked at taking a commission myself so spent time with a lot of junior officers. I say this as IDS took a commission in 1975 and left in 1981 as a lieutenant.

After 3 years you’re pretty much guaranteed your Captaincy and, at that time with a big commitment in Germany, after six you should be looking at Majority.

He then joined GEC Marconi which leads to a very curious quote in Wikipedia

He attended the company’s staff college Dunchurch College of Management. He did not gain any qualifications at Dunchurch and completed six separate courses lasting a few days each, adding up to roughly a month in total.

That’s just weird. He did some courses. Not mention of progression at all. He joined, he did some courses, end of.

He then joined a building company as the biggest housing slump hit the UK and was made redundant. Hardly the foresight of the true entrepreneur…

Now I dislike him and particularly think the manner of the introduction of universal credit and the hardship it put claimants through so take this with a pinch of salt but…

he appears to have been a crap soldier, a shit civilian and we all know what a fine figure of a leader of the Tory party he was.

That quote is just so much bollocks. It’s like all those ‘we’ll get through the Brexit, I got through the blitz’ of pensioners that were only just about born during the blitz.

8958

My dad was on a business/politician liaison committee with him, and has described him as one of the thickest people he’s ever met.

8959

I also once spent an evening looking through the regimental magazine of the Scots Guards in the 70s and if you looked at his history, he was rapidly shifted into a depot company and then sent off to be an AdC to the British mission covering the end of the Zimbabwean war for independence. The distinct hint that he was kept away from any prospect of real soldiering was quite strong,

8960

Considering that number, I bet they are satellite offices to get around some sort of regulatory or taxation issue.

8961

That’s exactly what a number of city firms have done. Most of the support services are kept local to the UK (at least for the moment) but the traders and the assets are shifted to the mainland and trade out of BigBank NV rather than BigBank plc.

8962

Ok, we have some early data:

UK imports from Germany fell 1.7bn€ while exports fell 2bn€. Trade balance fell from 1.6/1 to 2.6/1 in favor of Germany.

Just one month, so we’ll see. But we also have this:

Which means for a year UK exports to the EU will be hampered by checks while imports won’t, likely furthering the trade imbalance.

This is what sovereignty looks like?

8963

As Michael Gove once said, “I think the people of this country have had enough of exports.”

8964

Nice.

8965

Freeeeeeedom.

8966

And we now have full UK-EU trade balance numbers for January:

Trade balance has gone from 1.6/1 to 2.2/1 favoring the EU, and in the coming year the UK will face export hurdels while the EU will not due to the UK government being unprepared. Again, how much this is due to stockpiling is to be seen, and I want to see March-April numbers. Seems to me stockpiling is going to be balanced or have been higher in the UK (but we don’t have numbers).

8967

I mean, some of those exports from the EU we’d prefer not to have them. And we’d love for more exports from the UK.

Yes, I’m talking about the vaccines. :D

8968

Well I just discovered my ‘Brexit Bonus’ today.

I received a parcel of crockery from Germany (total around 80). They hadn’t charged me VAT and neither had DHL. I did manage to screw it up though by taking a chip out of one of the bowls virtually as soon as I put it down out of the back.

Not matched however by the £400 smart ring which I was forced to pay VAT (and an £11 charge) to DHL before they would deliver it.

8969

I had never heard of a “smart ring” before your post. So after a quick Google search I am curious as to which one you got.

8970

Brexit’ll make your ring smart all right.