I’ve got to say for all the bluster UK politicians and the bureaucrats of the EU have made over the past 4 years over Brexit they really screwed things up with aplomb. It takes years to build public confidence in international trade and a few weeks to to destroy it, especially with all with their haste to beat the deadline of 1st January.
I’m not going to cover the argument of for or against or any other reasons why we left the EU, the argument is over and the world moves on but anyone with an ounce of sense would have implemented the new rules agreed so late in the day with some leniency regarding customer charges. That is until these rules were fully understood by not only by business but by EU consumers who are now being hit with additional VAT charges on their orders made in the UK.
To the average person in the street hearing from media how the UK and EU reached a Tariff free trade deal only to find out afterwards that their imported goods will be charged local taxes as well as any charged here in the UK. By all accounts it works the other way round and UK customers need to be aware of this when buying things from any of the EU member countries.
I’d rather our European customers were fully aware prior to making a decision to buy, it’s only now we are learning about how it works in reality and I wish on the 1st January this year we could have posted this article.
We could accept the fact we have to jump through many new hoops and have much more paperwork as business owners to facilitate EU deliveries but it’s unfair on the consumer. I’m mostly upset about deceptive ways things have been implemented and believe the consumer needs to make their decisions full in the knowledge what is expected of them.
A sudden implementation of local VAT charges which are seen and referred to by customers as ‘custom charges’ when the EU & UK consumer’s were told how a free trade deal was agreed is nothing more than incompetence on a grand scale.
And on a positive note, we do sell all over the world far beyond Europe, not because we are cheap but because we are good at what we do. I guess those who still use and value our work and service will understand this is beyond our control and will still want to use good quality used tools.
If in doubt, we ask European customers to contact us before making a purchase to explain how best to order their tools to help reduce the new charges imposed by the EU commission.
