The Wall
Active Member
But my experience has been bitter with FedEx, except for the fast delivery , the charges and costs and gst and bla bla.... the delivery cost beyond the shipping, turned out to be higher than the vinyl cost itself !!
Vinyl stuck in Customs
- Thread starter osirees
- Start date
That is always the case, even for me cost of delivery plus customs in FedEx is more than the cost of vinyl. The issue I face is when I use FedEx is that if I use FedEx priority then they charge the correct amount of customs duty but if I use regular FedEx they charge very high customs duty which is why I have now switched to dhl. Unfortunately in our country importing anything is a bottomless pit with zero transparency in customs duty and blr airport is 45 kms away from the city which prevents me from connecting with the customs department. There should be an app where we can contest the duty amount. The amount I have spent on vinyl records so far is probably more than 5 times the price of my turntable , I'm sure it's the same for everyone. I have two more shipments coming after which I am going to take a break from buying records.
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
I got two discogs orders from France and Netherlands which were placed last month got delivered in 22-25 days by normal post.@osirees just curious did you get your package ? I was planning to order some too
Any duty charged for discogs order ?
as per my knowledge items delivered by india post doesnt attract customs duty but it depends on luck its 50:50 chance. recently i ordered wbt rca plugs from usa declared value as 120$ but luckily delivered by india post without any duty . took 45 days from usa to india
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
I have bought items from discogs for more than 20 times but never have I been levied a duty or lost a package. It has been always delivered by normal post .
I am awaiting one more package which has the highest single transaction value amongst the orders I have placed so far and let me see what it’s fate is going to be.
Wish you end up with same outcome as the rest of the packages
Can you recommend a few sellers on discogs please
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
Buy Vinyl Records and CDs from Otterskin at Discogs Marketplace
Check out our shop on Discogs, the biggest online music marketplace in the world, and add some gems to your collection!
wrekker69
Soundsaround
recordsale-de
bielik42
These are some sellers whom I have purchased from.
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
Wish you end up with same outcome as the rest of the packages
Can you recommend a few sellers on discogs please
If you wish to buy on discogs, you often find good deals but shipping costs make it costly. Unless you can buy 5-6 LPs from the same seller as often cost of shipping 1 LP is same as that of 5-6 LPs.
You should create a wish list of all the vinyls / CDs that you wish to purchase.
Once you have located a vinyl / CD that you want to buy , the website will automatically identify if the same seller has more items from your want list / wishlist. That will save you time to browse through the entire collection to find more items to buy to economise on shipping costs.
Also, if there are new items listed from your wantlist, you will automatically get an email saying that these items from your wantlist are now available.
In the case of LPs and probably true for CDs, it is better to have multiple copies of your favourite albums. So add to your wantlist and that enhances your chances of buying multiple items from the same seller to save on shipping costs.
reubensm
Well-Known Member
Whenever I have used FedEx or DHL, they have always taken care of the customs headaches. They usually get us to make a one-time submission of KYC documents online and that's it. They get the customs clearances done and we can pay up at the time of delivery.
Thanks a lot for thisFor CDs of English songs; quality as described and find prices very good including shipping.Buy Vinyl Records and CDs from Otterskin at Discogs Marketplace
Check out our shop on Discogs, the biggest online music marketplace in the world, and add some gems to your collection!www.discogs.com
For Bollywood vinyls.wrekker69
For Bollywood vinyl and English vinylSoundsaround
They are on discogs as well as they have their website . Found good deals here.recordsale-de
Has a good Bollywood collection.bielik42
These are some sellers whom I have purchased from.
Recently I ordered few LPs from JUNO on 18-05-2021 and then placed some order from ebay.co.uk (different sellers) on 19-05-2021. From Juno I Selected shipping via FedEx(With Tracking) as the other option was via Royal Mail (Without tracking) and the price difference was 1.5 Pound. It is not yet delivered and currently at Customs. But the Vinyls which I ordered via Ebay came through Royalmail(With Tracking) -> India post got delivered on 1st June.
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
Wish you end up with same outcome as the rest of the packages
Can you recommend a few sellers on discogs please
The package has arrived. No duty payable. Delivered by normal post.
antoniodias
Active Member
Lucky you Sir. What more do you seek. Am happy u got it free.
souravin
Well-Known Member
I buy Bollywood vinyl from an Amsterdam seller and post through PostNL. For past four purchases, I have received LPs within 6 weeks and that too without customs. These packets have been delivered by India Post. Even I choose normal post for JICO styli courier- later delivered through India post and that too without Customs. 
Thanks,
Sourav
Thanks,
Sourav
oracle1974
Well-Known Member
It is better to use normal post it seems like .
With Juno, no point selecting DHL. It may be a tad faster or even in some cases slower than RoyalMail and will attract customs most likely. I've had tens of orders with Juno delivered to me using RoyalMail with 0 duties so far. Also, the speed has been pretty impressive considering normal postal services. Usually gets delivered within a fortnight. In fact my last few orders got to me within 7 days from the despatch date. Recently tried this website called Diverse Vinyl in the UK and they also shipped via RoyalMail. Came to me without any customs duty within 2-3 weeks. Even my order from Sam Records in France came within 3 weeks using French postal service.
floydindian
Member
Great info.. in your experience, what is that threshold over which customs are usually levied?
I have been buying CDs and other Audio accessories since 2019 from UK(through Ebay). And almost every seller sent me via Royal Mail (with tracking). Which got delivered to me via India Post. As per my experience what I have observed is, usually the package takes max 5-7 days to reach India and then it goes for custom clearance. Custom department clears the package maximum within 7 days. Once it is cleared from Customs, it hardly takes 2 days to reach me at my Bangalore address. 99% of time my packages got cleared from either from Mumbai or Delhi customs.
This is the first time I am seeing so much delay. In fact my Vinyl Package from JUNO was Shipped on 18th May and the package reached India on 20th. Since then it is lying with Customs even after filling the KYC form to FedEx.
Earlier one of my friend warned me to avoid FedEx shipping method. As per him shipping via FedEx will take longer time and it may attract custom duty. But I went ahead as the other option in Juno is via Royal Mail but without tracking and I have once lost a package in past because the seller sent via without tracking. So to get rid of the fear of loosing my package, this time I selected FedEx and landed in this situation.
So my suggestion to all, Please avoid FedEx shipping method. Royal mail (with or without tracking) will get delivered faster without attracting the custom duty.
The beauty of Indian customs is that it is absolutely pattern-less. There is no logic on when and how much duty is levied. As I mentioned before, I have never attracted any customs on vinyls apart from when I ordered some 20-30 LPs from Amazon UK. That was a couple of large cartons and I was asked by my postman to visit the post office and I paid quite a lot. Ever since then I restrict my orders to less than 6 LPs. With Juno, even if you order 5-6 LPs (including double lp titles), they sometimes package it into two cardboard packages and that makes the load even and unassuming for our post. I don't think they even bother to look at the parcel values. My theory is that our postal service is pretty chill with packages that look like they are some sort of publications. They just find it perhaps too unattractive an item to attract customs on it. Good for us I'd say. We should all enjoy getting as many vinyls as possible this way before our postal service also recognises these black discs as important and starts charging us a bomb.
Another thing I've realised is that Juno offers insurance over a certain order value, I think it is 50GBP or something. So even if you order something with RoyalMail as the shipping option and you see in your order breakup insurance charges levied, (typically 3GBP on an order of 50GBP something) you can always claim refund for orders that never reached you. (One word of caution - Juno is amazing with their prices and availability of titles but they are quite the opposite when it comes to responsiveness about customer queries and grievances, it's not that they are bad but they are just a bit slow.) At times you will also find that if your order is say around 150GBP and you select RoyalMail as the delivery service, no insurance being offered. A bit random on their part is what I have found. Anyway, as per me, the risk to reward ratio is worth it. I mean what's the fun in selecting FedEx, waiting for almost as much, almost certainly paying customs but just be able to track the package and get frustrated because our customs will take a week or more to clear it. Better to opt for RoyalMail, assume that it will take 15-20 days to reahc you (mostly it will be lesser than that) and that too without any customs (almost every time), be able to claim insurance (when offered) if the package does not reach you and just not be able to track it. I think that is less stressful to not be able to track your package than knowing when the package reached customs and how they are sitting on it without clearing it for days. Anyway, that is what my experiences so far have made me order as but who knows ordering via FedEx, etc makes more sense in the future when circumstances are not what they are today.
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