GST AND DUTY

Right now, international purchases under $ , are GST free — anything over that and you need to declare the purchase to customs and pay the taxes. Mail forwarders typically rely on the user to ll out the correct forms, which can result in values being under declared to avoid tax. Of course if customs inspects the package and nds something amiss, you will get charged the tax anyway.

Calculating the potential tax has a few steps — the item value is based on the exchange rate on the day of export, not the day of purchase or arrival. If the value is under $ , , (excluding shipping) then no tax is payable. If the value is over $ , , you pay % tax on the item and international shipping costs combined. No tax is payable for any shipping fees within the country of origin.

Of course this is all set to change on July st, , when GST will be applied to all imports — though how it will be implemented is not yet known.