Tariff/import fee experience?

[LostArra]

I want to order some small parts from a company in the UK that has a store on eBay. The company is legit so no problem there.
The parts order is under $20 and the shipping is listed as $13.52 USD. All fine.

This is what I'm not sure about.
"Due to US customs policies, the buyer of this item will need to pay import fees to the shipping carrier prior to delivery. "

I have a message sent to the company to see if they know the amount of "import fee".
Does anyone have experience with import fees on small items from UK?

Thanks

 

[Tryin]

The actual .gov fees total around $13 for general goods purchases under $2500. What import companies actually charge is kinda up to them.

It used to be that purchases under $1500 were exempt, but it seems kinda grey now.

 

[Weldor]

I looked at some tractor parts from across the pond. About $20 for the part $19.99 to ship + some kind of tax + some other fee's. Rounds out to about $100 bucks for a $20 dollar part. No Thanks.

 

[LostArra]

update: the item I am buying is shipped DDP (Delivered Duties Paid) so price I see at checkout is the total. I'll update if necessary

https://www.royalmail.com/business/international/guide/delivered-duties-paid-ioss/pddp

 

[thinhorn_AK]

I was going to buy a fly rod from New Zealand but the terrifs fee was over 200 dollars and it did not have free shipping. It was going to cost over 1500 singer it so I didn’t get it.

 

[307]

I bought some fishing gear from China. The Chinese company paid the tariff/fees. It did take a while and there were some hassles getting through customs once in the ground in the USA.

 

[Titan]

I import some harvester parts from overseas. I get an email from UPS showing a balance due before they will deliver. I believe they rolled dice to come up with the amounts. Fedex sent bills a couple weeks after delivery.

 

[Poser]

I import some harvester parts from overseas. I get an email from UPS showing a balance due before they will deliver. I believe they rolled dice to come up with the amounts. Fedex sent bills a couple weeks after delivery.

UPS launched a tarriff refund portal just yesterday:

https://www.ups.com/us/en/shipping/international-shipping/tariffs/tariff-refunds"

UPS is committed to helping our customers navigate and adapt to changes in global trade policies, while complying with all government regulations.

The U.S. Court of International Trade has required U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to refund the 2025 tariffs collected under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) that were invalidated by the Supreme Court.

Effective April 20, 2026, CBP will launch the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) platform for Importers of Record (IORs) to begin submitting IEEPA tariff refund requests. CBP will process requests and issue IEEPA tariff refunds to IORs in several phases. The first phase will only cover refund requests for IEEPA entries finalized by CBP within the last 80 days, from January 30 - April 19, 2026.

For shipments where UPS was the IOR, we will work to request and retrieve IEEPA tariff refunds from CBP on our customers' behalf. There is no need for those customers to contact UPS. After we receive the funds from CBP, we have established a process to issue refunds to the payors.

According to CBP, it will take at least 60-90 days to deliver the requested refunds to IORs. UPS cannot issue IEEPA tariff refunds to payors until we receive the funds from CBP.

CBP has only provided guidance for shipments that qualify for refunds under Phase One at this time. For more information about the next phases of the IEEPA refunds, please visit the CBP IEEPA Refund Webpage.

We remain focused on keeping shipments moving and helping ensure our customers can fully exercise their rights throughout this complex process. We are closely monitoring legal developments and will share updates as available.

 

[mtnbiker208]

I have imported about 20 containers, during this time. The problem was the tarifff fee would change, while the goods where on the water or during shipment. The importers did not always know what the rate would be. ie the container shipped with one tariff rate, and when the container hit port, it was a different rate. We basically did not know what the rate was until we where billed, not when we ordered.

I don't know enough about the supposed refunds to be able to talk about that.

 

[Titan]

UPS launched a tarriff refund portal just yesterday:

https://www.ups.com/us/en/shipping/international-shipping/tariffs/tariff-refunds"

UPS is committed to helping our customers navigate and adapt to changes in global trade policies, while complying with all government regulations.

The U.S. Court of International Trade has required U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to refund the 2025 tariffs collected under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) that were invalidated by the Supreme Court.

Effective April 20, 2026, CBP will launch the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) platform for Importers of Record (IORs) to begin submitting IEEPA tariff refund requests. CBP will process requests and issue IEEPA tariff refunds to IORs in several phases. The first phase will only cover refund requests for IEEPA entries finalized by CBP within the last 80 days, from January 30 - April 19, 2026.

For shipments where UPS was the IOR, we will work to request and retrieve IEEPA tariff refunds from CBP on our customers' behalf. There is no need for those customers to contact UPS. After we receive the funds from CBP, we have established a process to issue refunds to the payors.

According to CBP, it will take at least 60-90 days to deliver the requested refunds to IORs. UPS cannot issue IEEPA tariff refunds to payors until we receive the funds from CBP.

CBP has only provided guidance for shipments that qualify for refunds under Phase One at this time. For more information about the next phases of the IEEPA refunds, please visit the CBP IEEPA Refund Webpage.

We remain focused on keeping shipments moving and helping ensure our customers can fully exercise their rights throughout this complex process. We are closely monitoring legal developments and will share updates as available.

Thanks for the info. No idea how or if I qualify. But i'm going to try and get those back for sure. I'm about to place a couple more orders also and it shows now that "non metal harvesting equipment parts" are now exempt.

 

[307]

I have imported about 20 containers, during this time. The problem was the tarifff fee would change, while the goods where on the water or during shipment. The importers did not always know what the rate would be. ie the container shipped with one tariff rate, and when the container hit port, it was a different rate. We basically did not know what the rate was until we where billed, not when we ordered.

I don't know enough about the supposed refunds to be able to talk about that.

That's got to be a tough way to run a business I'd imagine. Dang.

 

[EastHumboldt]

Professor Chaos strikes again!

 

[Macintosh]

The price you pay to import is the item cost, the freight cost, the actual duty (item $ * tariff rate), plus any other additional customs charges (the trump additional 10%, 20%, 150% etc, fentanyl 2%, whatever else they come up with next week, etc), plus the customs broker gets a fee for preparing the customs paperwork which is usually a flat fee + a % of the value of the goods above a threshold. The de minimus exemption doesnt exist anymore (previously it was shipments under $800 value were exempt from tariffs).

Regarding refunds—my strong educated guess is only the additional trump tariffs from 2025 beyond the standard tariff will get refunded. So if the item had a 5% tariff originally and a 10% tariff was added in 2025, you will only get that 10% portion back. Not the original 5% duty, not brokerage fee, etc. Tons of outdoor items had legitimate 15-32% duties already that were never in question, so depending on what it was you might only get a small portion of the duty you paid back in any refund.

So a $100 item with a standard 5% tariff you might pay 100+ 20 shipping + 5 tariff + a $21 brokerage fee (20 flat fee + 1% of the first $500 in goods)=$146

During last summer you might have paid 100 + 5 tariff, + 2 fentanyl surcharge + 20 taiwan reciprocal tariff + 20 shipping + 21 brokerage= 168

In this case if you got refunded you would only get refunded for some or all of the $22 difference.