I emailed them about this and i have not had any reponse from them.
Until they change there shipping ways i wouldnt orderer from them again.
Lie back and think of England!
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Introducing Lady LorReign| Author | Post |
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| nruddock Member UK 92 Posts 1/00 |  Posted - Mar 17 2001 : 2:46PMI just got my first international order from Fivestar. They sent me two dvd’s in a box the size of a board game, so UK customs opened it and charged me about £8. Does Fivestar usually send packages to the UK in such obvious boxes? It didn't even fit in my letterbox! If they sent them in a small box or a Jiffy bag, then no matter what the price of the good was, customs & the post-office wouldn’t add to the cost. [Link] |
| ant_si Member England 90 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 17 2001 : 3:23PM I emailed them about this and i have not had any reponse from them. Until they change there shipping ways i wouldnt orderer from them again. Lie back and think of England! [Link] |
| DLC Member 8 Posts 11/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 5:01AM [Link] |
| Joey Starr Senior Member Still wanking after all these years. 8082 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 6:24AM I was going to order from them but now that I've read your post and others, I'll pass and stick with my regular US supplier, Adult Lasersedge. Until they get their act together on UK shipping, I guess Five Star's customer base will be VERY small. Joey in London [Link] |
| Joey Starr Senior Member Still wanking after all these years. 8082 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 6:26AM Joey [Link] |
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| joeblow69 Member 946 Posts 2/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 11:20AM Are companies that send DVD's into the UK supposed to say on the package how much the contents are worth? If so, is that a law? Can a company get in trouble if they DON'T put the value on the outside of the box? [Link] |
| ant_si Member England 90 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 2:50PM The customs in the UK will look at the green sticker which says what is in the parcel and and how much its worth, If its over £18 then they will charge you Tax. Only five star do this other companies will mark down the price to under£18. Lie back and think of England! [Link] |
| nruddock Member UK 92 Posts 1/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 3:56PM [Link] |
| Saki At-Large 2087 Posts 11/99 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 4:19PM - Saki [Link] |
| JMO Member UK 104 Posts 2/01 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 7:36PM The problem is in the Customs declaration. If Customs suspect the package is more valuable than the declared value, then they'll simply think of a number and charge you VAT on it. I suspect in the case of the £40 DVD, the Customs official had bought the same disk from his local sex shop and charged on the value of that. I strongly suspect HM Customs and Excise are getting a bit more thorough about imported DVDs. Theoretically they can't touch them because of the Human Rights Act, but The Powers That Be don't want the plebs buying porn, so the idea is to charge heftily on the VAT. Most courier services charge hefty levies for Customs paperwork and that added to the cost and the Customs charges should dissuade people from ordering from abroad. If Ken from FiveStar reads this, I'd suggest putting the disks in a Jiffy bag, quote the value as minus the postage on the envelope and declare it as "optical media". ;o) [Link] |
| nruddock Member UK 92 Posts 1/00 | Posted - Mar 18 2001 : 7:50PM I agree with you 100%. Hopefully Ken will read this topic. [Link] |
| five_star Five Star DVD Tempe, AZ 167 Posts 11/99 | Posted - Mar 19 2001 : 4:17PM I was quite surprised when I read this thread describing us as using “Bad packaging”. In the past we have received a great deal positive feedback from our customers regarding our securely packed boxes. Customers often praise our generous use of packing material and well protected merchandise. We ship a significant number of domestic and international orders and we have received very few packaging complaints. The main issue here seems to focus specifically on international packages being too large. We are certainly open to using a different type of package. I am not familiar with the term “Jiffy Bag” but we definitely look into using a padded envelope or a Tyvek envelope. Our #1 priority is making sure that the merchandise arrives securely and if we can make the package smaller at the same time then we will. Regarding the customs declaration form, we declare the “actual” value of the merchandise not including shipping and we describe the merchandise as “DVD software”. Perhaps we could declare “optical media” instead but I am not sure what difference this would make. If anyone has any further comments or suggestions please feel free to contact me directly: graham@fivestardvd.com Ken Graham [Link] |
| ant_si Member England 90 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 19 2001 : 5:20PM I sent you letter over a week ago about your shipping to the UK but recived no email back, does this mean it was ignored? Lie back and think of England! [Link] |
| five_star Five Star DVD Tempe, AZ 167 Posts 11/99 | Posted - Mar 19 2001 : 7:09PM Our staff has been unable to find any recent email from you. The last message we received from you was on 2/8. If you have any questions or suggestions about our shipping policies I would be very interested in hearing from you. Ken Graham [Link] |
Bill  All-Star Member 5334 Posts 6/00 | Posted - Mar 19 2001 : 8:00PM Jiffy Bags are the largest brand of padded envelopes. Their market share has caused padded envelopes fo become commonly known as Jiffy Bags (kind of like a Q-tip for a cotton swap or Band-Aid for an adhesive bandage). They come in many different sizes. You can see some examples here. Unfortunately the USPS does not provide these for priority mail, so you will be stuck paying for them if you decide to use them. Bill [Link] |
| Joey Starr Senior Member Still wanking after all these years. 8082 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 9:10AM Joey in London UK [Link] |
| Joey Starr Senior Member Still wanking after all these years. 8082 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 9:15AM Joey [Link] |
| five_star Five Star DVD Tempe, AZ 167 Posts 11/99 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 3:03PM Our policy is to declare the actual price that you were charged not including shipping. We have received a few reports where UK customs (with out any explanation) decided to raise the declared value. That may be why you noticed a discrepancy and you may be able to dispute this. However, if we made an error on your customs form please contact our customer service department and we will be happy to correct it. Ken Graham [Link] |
| JMO Member UK 104 Posts 2/01 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 3:14PM Thanks for listening. Cheers. Mark. [Link] |
| DLC Member 8 Posts 11/00 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 4:06PM [Link] |
| ant_si Member England 90 Posts 10/00 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 4:48PM
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| five_star Five Star DVD Tempe, AZ 167 Posts 11/99 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 5:11PM I apologize if I haven’t explained things clearly enough in this thread so I’ll try again. · We declare the actual merchandise total (not including shipping). · If we made a mistake, please contact customer service and we will correct it. · UK customs may change the declared value. You can dispute these changes with UK customs. · We understand that some customers are unhappy with our international boxes. Effective tomorrow we will begin to use Jiffy Bags for small international orders. If there is anything else that you’d like to discuss, please feel free to email me. Ken Graham [Link] |
| nruddock Member UK 92 Posts 1/00 | Posted - Mar 20 2001 : 7:41PM [Link] |
| JMO Member UK 104 Posts 2/01 | Posted - Mar 21 2001 : 2:47PM [Link] |
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