big_matt

Yea the familiarity/history thing is definately making me think about taking mine even at a loss.

It's had two comprehensive services in the last 3 months (one from VW themselves and one from the car supermarket) and has really detailed history etc. I can even get another service for free before taking it.

That peace of mind may be worth it, and if I ended up buying a new one in Oz that had lots of issues i'd be worse off anyway.

goingau

has anyone shipped a trailer over?

when i got the quote for a car container they said i could fill the rest up with house hold stuff, so i thought one step further.
quicker than emtpying it by hand then reloading.

cromergirl

Thanks for all the information.

Could you please confirm is Autoshippers the main company in the UK to provide the roll on / roll off service.

In addition does anyone have details of a company in Perth that can handle the re-import process. We have been advised of International Trade Management (ITM).

Has anyone used ITM, what were they like? Or are you able to advise/recommend another company in Perth for this process.

Thanks

CG

Alfresco

The shipping Company provided all the subsequent contacts on the Australian side, which you can choose to use or not to. I just went with what they recommended.

Ask them.

cromergirl

Just wondered if anyone has used AutoShippers in the past for a roll on roll off service ?

Were you happy with the service they provided ?

Is there another company that anyone has used that they would recommend ?

Thanks

Alfresco

We did use them for roll on roll off. See the second post to this thread.

We were happy with them. It worked.

Rhubarb65

Matt - check out whether you will be eligible to import the car if you have only recently purchased it in the UK. When I looked to import our car nearly 3 years ago (we didn't in the end and rather regret not doing so now), it was a requirement that the car was owned by you for at least 12 months prior to requesting approval to import. I am not up-to-date with the current legislation, just something to be aware of and check.

I agree with the sentiment about familiarity and known history of a car.

OverRun

I am coming in a bit late to this thread, but I wanted to echo Rhubarb65's warning about checking the eligibility for import. I imported a car once and I rather regretted it. The paperwork was immense, and the issues to get the car registered and Australian Design Rule compliant were onerous.

The Australian officials are very thorough at checking the paperwork too; they can contact the dealer and get his copy of your sales invoice to check on your paperwork – they have people in their local embassy that do this so it is a thorough local check. Customs might ask for every page of your passport to be copied and certified to prove that you have been out of Australia for the requisite time. It is not an area to take shortcuts or be “inaccurate”.

There was a grey parallel import market for cars into Australia 10-15 years ago, fuelled by the high price for cars purchased in Australia. The Government then legislated to cut this market out, and the Australian dealers banded together to try and stop it as well. I found that now the Australian dealers don't want to know about your imported car and won’t support it – after all they want a local sale for themselves. On complex modern cars, and especially European cars such as Citroen and Renault, that is a problem because the dealers are the only stockists of major spare parts.

The cost of shipping is only one thing to consider in weighing up the import decision, and looking back at my experience, shipping cost must have been relatively unimportant because I have forgotten what I paid to ship the car, but I can still remember all the other issues.

Alfresco

Indeed! I checked before shipping, that our car (Hyundai) would be serviceable in Oz, otherwise I wouldn't have done it. Turns out, I haven't had any probs with services or spares etc... Just had a tow bar fitted and no problems.

big_matt

That's a good shout thanks - I will look into this.

The more I investigate prices of cars in Oz the more frightening they look. Taking my car over would be ideal if its allowable and not a ridiculous amount of hassle.

Alfresco

You can get it all done for you, just costs more.