Armortek

Hi,
This is also the first time I have experienced this in this form.
I always base myself on the Gentlement's agreement principle.
Only this time I don't have luck on my side.
Actually, I don't want to pollute the forum with this message, but I would like to warn people that unfortunately there is sometimes a bad apple among them!
Regards,
Jan

I agree with the gentlemanly approach towards things. Besides, I sympathize with the circumstance you are in. I don’t think your message is any way polluting the forum, but rather providing insight so that fellow forum members can be cautions and careful.

Being cautious on large purchases is essential. Trust builds over time .

As a general principle, using PayPal would have given you some degree of recourse in this matter. I am still looking to buy a Jadgtiger and a King Tiger - either unbuilt kit or full built … but only with PayPal and a clear invoice with terms spelled out.

Wish you the best .

Import duty / tax is not paid by the seller ( so cannot be included in the purchase price ), but by the purchaser to the tax authorities of the country it is being imported into. I have purchased one of the Bailey Bridge kits for delivery to Germany. No VAT payable on the purchase price but will get hit by MehrwertSteur (German equivalent) before I can collect it from the customs office.

Also I do suggest you do not rely on Paypal. I use it a lot for on-line transactions. Only had one go bad, got only 20% of the goods purchased and Paypal sided on the seller. The Paypal guarantee sounds good untill you actually have to use it.

Certainly valid points. I use PayPal with Amex for my transactions. This offers a double layer of protection. But also I am an Amex platinum cardholder so that offers me additional safety measures. My experience with PayPal has been very good so far but Amex is even better. A couple of years ago a seller changed his mind on an item price that I had paid for. He wanted additional 500GBP more than the agreed price and refused to ship- so I initiated a refund process and got all money including the transaction fees back.

What is interesting here is that it appears Jan may have sent the “presumable” customs duty to the seller. I am not sure but Jan may be able to shed light here.

Bet that as it may the take home message is
1) as a buyer always check your own country laws and handle it directly with customs
2) use a secure for of payment with an ability for recourse - whether it is PayPal or whatever one chooses ; but certainly not direct money transfers
3) proper tracking number for shipment
4) take time in building trust

We are in touch with both Liam as well as Jan.
Hopefully the situation will be resolved soon and I request that in the interim there is a pause on positing on this thread.

Kian