Importing computing equipment from the US: Will you save money?

Ridiculous courier fee... Can get stuff couriered much cheaper! Use Insured post! Also dont they exclude the US tax when the parcel is going out of the country? I know the UK does this!
 
Yes, the US tax is incorrect, you don't pay that for exports.

The SA taxes also look too high, you only pay VAT on computers.

And I agree that the courier fees are way too high.

I have recently imported a notebook, and a netbook, the costs were way lower than indicated in these examples.
 
The article should include the south african cost of those items so it can be compared with the import cost.
 
Take the iPhone 3GS 32GB for example, available from Apple for $299. Base price no shipping etc.
Pay-in on contract @ Vodacom R3500. Total rip-off.
 
I was also looking at importing a few small car accessories. and netbook from ebay. seeing that we can now use paypal.
Would appreciate some more info on this route
 
Staff Writer... Who are you fooling? Your prices and estimates are way out there. What a waste!
 
Anthropoid said:
Post up some rand value examples of your experience(s)
Click to expand...

Will do - just don't have the detailed info with me at the moment - will post later.

But Sony i3 NoteBook + Asus Router = USD908.29 + Shipping = USD122.50 (USPS Global Express and EMS locally)

Taxes were approx R1149 (including R100 clearing). FX Rate = 7.50 Note that you don't pay taxes on shipping (VAT = cost * 1.1 * 14%)

Total Approx = R8880 for Notebook and Router. Notebook cost over R11 000 here at that time.

Cost of imported Notebook excluding router was about R8000.

It was Sony CW (500GB HD, 4GB RAM, 2.2GHz i3, W7 64 bit, 14" screen, nVidia graphics, etc, etc)
 
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I've imported a few items from the US before and it has always worked out cheaper than buying in SA. If this wasn't written by a staff writer I would think it was a piece propaganda written by The Core Group.
 
FX Rate on the rand is about R/$8.05 (today) (Spot of R/$7.71) since you are BUYING dollars and not selling.
 
Get the facts right

This is a very poor article. The author should research his/her facts.

VAT is never charged on exported goods . On entry to ZA, the buyer will pay wharfage (usually a small amount) and prevailing ZA VAT.

So not really news at all, and given that the author does not even compare the costs with a locally sourced equivalent, its all pretty meaningless!

I can assure readers that when I buy BluRay disks from Amazon UK (usually when they have a sale) I save a packet over what I would pay locally!
 
I haven't bought electronics from the US but I have bought a textbook which I needed for my geology course. I couldn't find it anywhere, so i decided to order it from Amazon. (Local stores would order a copy for me but they said it would take +- 6-8 weeks.) So ordered it online and got it a week or two later. In the end, I paid LESS (all costs included) than what the local book stores wanted to charge me for the book (if they ever managed to get it.)
 
I think rpm was using the worst case scenario because there are cheaper ways to get goods into SA BUT the problem arises when there is a warranty claim. Many of the multi-nationals in SA will not honour warranties if a product was purchased outside SA which means you would either need to send it back to the supplier abroad or find someone here to fix it for you provided they can source the parts.
 
the only problem is warranty...so i only buy when it is half price...which it normally is....so if it breaks i can import another for the same price as one here :)
 
krouxsa said:
Staff Writer... Who are you fooling? Your prices and estimates are way out there. What a waste!
Click to expand...
I see you know exactly what it costs ;)

As mentioned in the article, these are not estimates, but rather real-life examples. You may well be able to do it cheaper, but then please tell us how and give exact figures (not estimates or theoretical examples please).

This is what the article is about: Real world costs.
 
these prices do look a bit too much... never had such bad experiences with my imports, i normally just use the money i would've saved from the import to take a short holiday abroad :D so no shipping charges for me... and theres no duty on computer imports, only VAT...
 
I see a few guys may misunderstand the article: We are not estimating costs – this is actually what it cost to import the item. We mentioned that there are cheaper ways to do it, but this is at least two real-life examples.

BTW: Try importing custom Lenovo S510 Laptop from Lenovo.com – not possible. Not even possible to pay with a local CC ;) Hence the taxes and the like hold.
 
Generally I find that you'll pay (current exchange rate in Rands * 1.3) per dollar for items you import from overseas (this includes shipping, tax, etc.). So yes, the numbers in the original article are way off.
 
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