All international "Gift" packages now liable for customs duty @ 77%(?)

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So from what I observed over the last couple of months, China Post Registered or China Post Small Packet is really really slow. There appears to be a lot of backlog that the package reaches India only 25-30 days after leaving China.

Whereas Singapore Post or even non tracked Yanwen and other similar options, reach India much quicker.

Once in India, the processing time is pretty same for all.

Also, if you see the option to get packages by Gati, opt for it, comes directly to Delhi and from there last mile by Speedpost.

The Soap Dispenser was supposed to come via GATI as I had selected that.

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It was shipped via Yanwen and it was supposed to be handed over to GATI once it reaches in India. Instead, Yanwen tracking showed 'Last mile connectivity GATI' and a tracking number which looked like a normal postal one.

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Yeah, so that other tracking number ie EQ975809992IN is usually trackable on 迦递货运代理(上海)有限公司 and once its dispatched from Delhi on Government of India, Department of Post also.

However in your case, looks like the package got lost, damaged or maybe held at Delhi and never got forwarded from there.

Gati atleast now only seems to be taking care of getting the item to India, and last mile is always through Speedpost.
 
So I have this package coming, is bigger in size, and the status is now Custom Receive. For most other packages, it usually goes directly to Item Dispatched from Kochi IMC.

My guess is that, if it shows as Custom Receive, then the package was selected as dutiable and would most likely have customs duty attached to it.

On this topic, below shows two of my packages

Package status moved directly to Item Dispatched from Kochi IMC without the Custom Receive and Custom Hold in between.

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Another package, clearly was stuck at Kochi IMC for evaluation and duty.

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Now both these are relatively bigger packages and would be in boxes and not just a padded envelope. Second package would be more bigger in size (it's a router). I'm not sure what the declared value for the packages are, but I paid around 1.8k fo the 1st package and around 3k for the 2nd package.

Will know tomorrow or Monday on what the real situation is about the customs duty. ;) 🤞

PS : The above also shows how slow China Post Registered is compared to Singapore Post.
 
Got both the packages today. The router had duty at 42% or so. The seller had put the full value in the customs declaration 😑😑😑

Ended up paying Rs 1420 as duty + Rs 30 as postage charges. Total Rs 1450. Declared value came to Rs 3373.

The other package (which directly went to Dispatched from Kochi IMC) had no duty. It had a declared value of 15 USD or so but came duty free.

My guess is they select packages for customs evaluation based on the size of the box. The router packaging was significantly big in size.

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This was the receipt, if I understood it correctly, if you think the duty charged is incorrect, it says that you need to directly represent the facts at the customs office. In my case that would be at Ernakulam FPO.


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Anyway I can't really argue cause the seller put the entire amount in the declaration and the duty was charged as per the declaration.

Also, the other package, had a declaration of 14.81 USD and was marked as gift, but no duty was charged. I wonder if the new changes are not yet implemented? The package had an IndiaPost tape on one side, it looked like they did open the side to see what's written on the box. Bit confused 🤔

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Will sellers declare lower customs with Fedex IE or Aramex shipping on AliExpress ? I wanted to buy this router/mini-pc and the seller has "free" shipping with Aramex but its 10 Dollars extra for postal shipping. Is it too big to slip past customs without getting 40% duty?
 
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