Mopar Muscle Association UK

Purchased two items direct from USA recently.
First item was $20, but shipping was 24$ (only a speedo drive!)
Second item, nice Master cylinder for $65, another $35 shipping and then clobbered today by customs for a further £18. That makes total $ in shipping and customs the same as buying the actual item

On a brighter note, picked up some obscure trainers from the USA and only $10 to ship to the UK. Do wonder if US Mopar supliers are stiching us up on the shipping.

My golden rule - use a vendor that uses USPS (thats the US postal service). Their rates are very good (I had a small box shipped for about $7, as cheap as sending it within the UK).
If you go to their website it shows you the options, much like our own Post Office. You can use the letter rate for light boxes etc, not even all the vendors know that.

however for heavy/large stuff, not sure you will have a choice, or maybe USPS are not as competitive there. I've always managed to bring large stuff back personally.

Most large vendors will not mess around, they'll use Fedex or UPS etc. So I look for a small vendor that uses USPS, and it works out well.

Also depends on how quickly you want it - I've usually got USPS stuff within a week or two, which is quick enuff for me. If you want it next day - be prepared to pay!
since all the duty, VAT etc is calculated on the price including shipping, cheaper shipping really pays off.

You can get large stuff shipped from the US at a reasonable rate, but .... you need to be there.

When Linda was in Princeton, she ended up with (literally) a ton of books. We hauled it down to the USPS mail office and they gave us old fashioned sacks, with locks and turn buckles (still have them, very handy).

We loaded up the bags almost until they were unmovable and handed them in.

They come by ship, so it is slooooooooow, weeks and weeks, but cheap.

But cheap.

Strange how US ebayers manage to find the ost expensive shipping ever, even for magazines.

ATB

Edit: ignore this, apparently they have stopped doing this. Everything has to come by air now. Dept of Homeland Security strikes again.

My vendor used UPS, his shipping was enough and the uK charges worse. Thats said, I recieved the kit today and it is quality and still less than UK vendors could quote.
Problem is, i'd like to bring some sheetmetal in, but shipping would really add up.

ups are the dearest & the customs charges always seem more with them ,but they are good service

Sandy wrote:Edit: ignore this, apparently they have stopped doing this. Everything has to come by air now. Dept of Homeland Security strikes again.

There is still a similar service called 'media mail' for books. But it may only be available for people attached to US forces overseas.

As a rule of thumb airfrieght normally works out at around £1.30 per KILO of item flown. BUT there is a volume (i.e. cubic space the item takes up in the plane) charge which can be quite big.

As a rule the larger postal companies like DHL, UPS, FEDEX will be running their own planes over the atlantic, but have no passengers to subsidise the flight costs. Lower volumes during certain months of the year means they have to hedge their costs and fix a price which covers all risks of the costs, so you end up paying a higher rate, but get a more direct service.

US postal service (USPS) will be loading smaller mail into commercial flights like BA/United Airlines which will be running 10-20 times per day across the pond so the flight cost is already (supposedly) paid for by the passengers and any extra cargo is extra bunce. To max out the earning potential of the commercial flight the carrier e.g. BA will be quite competetive for USPS to use, however that saving may not be passed on all the time.

I got great service from Kev Carrington (Kev73dart on here ) is based in the US , ordered the parts, paid the money as he got them and he brought them over but do know he will post the most economical way he can for you.

Regards

Justin

Tried again today as i noticed that dollar was gaining on the pound.
One Lunati cam kit and a set of pistons and rings =$495 plus $180 shipping.
Landed was £500 at my door, if i proceeded. Be interesting to see if a UK supplier can make a better deal based on bulk purchasing and shipping

At the £ being about $1.64 I think I would wait unless it was life or death..............

Shocking ain't it Pete! So glad i got all my loot when it was 1.90-odd, saved a small fortune

I bought an 8ft dodge ram bedliner for £218+vat from dodge uk, it had to come from the us (obviously) a 17 ton truck turned up with it in a create approx 9ft long X 2ft high & 7 ft wide, how did they manage to ship it, let allown buy it for that sort of money ?
bargain
needed an antiroll bar drop link, some of the dealers wanted more monet than dodge uk, but neil @ usa imports was only 1/2 the price