bons

Has anyone received a parcel from outside the EU, not UK? I have a parcel tracking which was doing freat until it reached Custms clearance on the 28th February, and that is where it remains. I know there are issues with this, anyone any info on this or exerience of how long it took? As usual, thanks for replies.

morro

You have to pay the import tax online.
Then you pay vat on the tax!!!!!!
I received a hat from USA today, wrong colour, 100% nylon, made in China- rubbish!!!!!
This was CTT, so difficult!!

bons

Sorry to hear that. How long was it in customs for? We are ready to pay the tax but haven't received any notification of it. It's not with CTT.

morro

3 weeks, not so bad! Just wait for the email to pay tax via multibanco, then vat! I will never buy outside Europe again! Amazon es. are very good, and Amazon de. With Prime es. is free. Good luck!

bons

Thanks I think I'll need it. It's only been two weeks so far, so maybe I should give it another week.

liveaboard

It always takes longer than you think; then you get the notice from CTT and you have to jump through a lot of hoops.
Low priced items are still coming in free (sometimes anyway) so maybe you'll be lucky.
I just had a couple of small tools from China arrive with no extra cost.

Rambling archer

Bons, I do not know if you are aware, but there are multiple scams going on at present, purporting to be about items held up for customs payments via CTT - mostly SMSs but also emails, I would suggest that you do not automatically respond to anything you eventually get about your parcel, but take your message (SMS or email on your phone) to your local office and check if it is genuine! The links inside these scam messages lead you to give up lots of info leading to misuse of your data/bank account/ID etc.
If your parcel is not coming through CTT, can you check with the delivery company quoting your tracking number to ask where it is ?

bons

Thanks for making me aware of that. I don't thnk anyone has phone or email expect the vendor, but if a scam came through now it would be easy to react to it. I have a tracker and it's just states 'customs clearance Lisbon', 28th February, so I suppose I'm awaiting the letter. My niece sent me a present last year and I got the letter, but I only received a second letter,not the first and missed it so it went back to sender.

J00ls

I have friends in Australia who would not listen to my warnings about sending me parcels for my birthday. The first parcel arrived and was detained by the 'Alfandango' so I then began the business of finding the right form, deciphering it etc. Since the parcel did not contain anything much other than sweets and I couldn't understand the form, I just didn't bother. I was never even notified about the second parcel, ( also from Australia). It was returned to sender and I never even knew about it. My friends down under were flabbergasted - but they all believe me now. You can get lucky on occasion but on the whole, parcels from outside the EU are not worth the hassle.

bons

I'm beginning to think so. Still awaiting a letter or smething from customs.

zoff

Yes. I fell for this scam and I've been using the internet since it was mostly text based! I was waiting for a package from the US that was supposed to arrive around the date of the sms and the link was to "CTT", I filled out the "customs" form on the "CTT" site and since the fee was for only a few euros I didn't think much of it. I latter saw 3 purchases for €98 from a company in Switzerland when my bank called with a fraud alert.

Rambling archer

Zoff - so sorry to hear that but it does seem rather widespread at present !!!

liveaboard

The real notice has your name and address on it; also, pay attention to the links. If you hover the curser over the link, you should see the real web address appear in a tiny window. If it's not ctt.pt, you know it's a scam mail.

bons

It gets worse. I've put the tracking number into the CTT site and they are supposed to have sent something to us on the 3/3 requesting fiscal number, proof of payment and invoice. We've received nothing, it's just on the traking sheet on their website. I went to the Post Office and she gave us two names to look up to ocntact customs, we had a Portuguese friend contact customs yesterday and we weren't any furhter forward than we are now. I'm not sure it's a proper CTT as it's in Shopping in Tavira. We'll have to try again on Monday.

Thanks for the info about the scam livebroad.

Score76

In my experience the process is quite straight forward. I regularly buy things from China, Hong Kong and Singapore. If the sender has accounted for EU vat then it doesn't get stopped, it just gets delivered. If not, as long as the sender includes your mobile number or email address somewhere on the package or paperwork you'll receive the notice from CTT to do customs clearance.

You can do that online, here:
https://www.ctt.pt/particulares/rece...r-encomendasIf you don't have an account, create one.
You add the parcel to your account using it's tracking number. You have to give it the right HS code as with any import so customs know what it is and can apply the right level of duty and IVA. Follow the screens through. It asks you to upload the invoice, proof of payment for the invoice and product brochure, I generally upload the same thing three times and have had anything queried. At the end of the process it gives you multibanco details to pay duty/IVA. Once paid the parcel arrived in a few days.

Watch out for expedited shipping, IVA is charged on this but not on standard.