Parcel Forwarding Services - Europe to UK

[Dr.Al]

Has anyone used something like this and do you have any recommendations / things to watch out for?

I want to buy some trousers. As a tall person, this is not as easy as you might think as most manufacturers' "tall" leg length is far too short for me (very few manufacturers seem to accept that inside leg measurements can be longer than waist measurements). When I find a pair of trousers that fit and are a reasonable price, I tend to buy in bulk if possible / affordable.

Craghoppers do some "extra long" length trousers, which are just about long enough for me. On their UK site, this size isn't listed. On their EU site, it is listed (and offered for a lot less money than the normal length ones on the UK site). The problem is that the EU site won't ship to the UK. I contacted Craghoppers and asked if they could help me buy the trousers from the European site but they said some rubbish about "not manufacturing those sizes in the UK" (the ones I've bought before say "Made in Bangladesh") and hence it being contrary to the laws of thermodynamics or something to be able buy the trousers and get them shipped to the UK .

Despite the singularly unhelpful nature of their customer support staff, I'd still quite like to order a few pairs of the trousers. My plan was to get them delivered to the "Air B&B" place in Brittany we were going to be staying at in June, but that holiday has had to be cancelled so I'm thinking that an alternative might be to use a parcel forwarding service. I don't want to leave it until our next trip to France as I think the trousers are end-of-line (currently on 70% discount) and may not be available for much longer. Suggestions / recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Mike]

Ah...Brexit...the gift that keeps on giving. Having gone through a similar process several times, but in reverse, I recommend finding someone in the EU who will receive the commercial shipment and forward it to your UK address as a private shipment. This will still require the second destination sender to fill out the required customs forms.

The Germans are very efficient at assessing VAT, import duties, and fees on all commercial and private shipments coming from the UK. I have no idea how efficient HMRC will be for private shipments.

 

[Tiresias]

Mmm, that is what I would recommend. We've done it before with some good friends in krautland and the land of the turnip. And in reverse. Although my partner may have unintentionally underestimated the declared values.

Could you send it to a poste restante, and ping over on the cheapest flight you can find? I'd offer to bring it back myself, but we're not due to be back in Brussels until August. And my partner is not going the Heidelberg conference this year.

 

[MJ80]

I'd be happy to ship them, I'll be back in Germany next week

 

[Dr.Al]

Thanks for the offer & the suggestions. Unfortunately, I left it a bit too late - I've just checked back on the Craghoppers website and they've sold out of my size on the European website

You snooze you lose. Ah well...

 

[AJB Temple]

Just wondering if you could find a local tailor / seamstress and get some made to measure for a sensible price? Just been watching sewing bee....

 

[Andy Kev.]

At the risk of hijacking Dr Al's thread (apologies!), I have a very similar but reverse problem. I'm a member of The Wine Society and have some wines in storage with them. After Brexit happened they threw their hands in the air and decided that sending things to the continent was all too difficult for them. I pointed out that if I order things from e.g. the USA or Canada, they just send them via a courier e.g. UPS which takes over the admin, collects the import duties etc. That is apparently still too difficult but they said that they would happily deliver a case of wine to a courier service in the UK for onward transport. I obviously have to organise this.

Therefore my question is that assuming I opted for UPS or DHL, does anybody know what steps I would have to take to make it happen?

 

[Mike]

Andy, depending on how much wine you have in storage, you might consider contacting the Mail Boxes Etc. nearest to the storage facility to arrange for collection, packing, and shipping. I know MBE in Germany offers this service for domestic and international destinations, so MBE in the UK might be the same. MBE uses UPS and FedEx for the carrier and both take care of the customs and duty forms. If you have a lot of wine in storage, it might be more economical to collect it yourself.

A few years ago, I made two trips to Verona, about 850 KM each way, with a friend to buy wine from four wineries. We bought 80 cases in each trip and wanted more, but I couldn't fit any more in my open bed truck (weight and volume). For 80 cases, it was worth the expense to make the trip, but for smaller purchases later, it was better to have the winery ship the wine to me.

In March, I bought eight more cases of wine from one of the Verona wineries and the FedEx standard shipping was €160. The bottles were packed in a special cardboard box that would have survived a trip to Mars and arrived three days later.

 

[Tiresias]

This is not directly useful, other than a basic principle. Some years ago I needed to send 23 copies of one of my investment analyses down to the Great Wen. Syndicated loan.

I got my secretaries to get costs for couriers. Astronomical. I ended up getting one of my junior staff a flight down to London and back. Even after giving him about £50 for lunch and ‘expenses’ we were still quids in.

Moral of story: if you have the time (or someone else’s time) it’s frequently cheaper to do it yourself.

(Oh, and perhaps the Scottish trait of economy/parsimony is a stereotype for a reason).

 

[Andy Kev.]

Mike, thanks for the tip ref MBE. I had never heard of them and will look into it. That sounds ideal.