selling outside the EU

[pnagames]

Hi everyone

we are considering starting to sell outside the EU (canada / US / Australia)

what are other people's experiences?

are there any legal requirements in addition to what we are doing now?

[Rich Brady]

If you're VAT registered you can promote the fact that product and shipping costs will be discounted by 15%, which always goes down well.

You have to be aware of import duty at the customers end.

Also, American customer IME do seem to have an unrealistic idea of how much something costs to ship to them.

[Donna Kempster]

Just a note of caution all our insurances prohibit us selling to the US!

[bamboo]

Just a note of caution all our insurances prohibit us selling to the US!

Good grief.
Could you please explain why as I cannot see any reason why your products cannot be sold in America. Neither can I see the logic in using an insurance company who is forcing you to do business on their restrictive terms.

[Donna Kempster]

I assume its because the US is so litigious (not sure how you spell that!) we could sell to the US but our insurance rates would go through the roof.

[Rich Brady]

Why? Are we talking bunting & kids bedding here Donna or do you have another site?

[Mike Hughes]

The same comment about Insurance. Your liability insurance will probably have asked if you sell to US and you won't be covered unless you declare it (and it then gets expensive).

The biggest problem I found is with shipping. The cost can be expensive, goods can take a long time to be delivered, and the complaints and hassle often make it more trouble than it's worth. You might be Ok with small items but I've had problems with those too.

Another issue is people ordering from the US and not realising the price is in pounds rather than dollars.

I now take orders from the UK only. Realistically, for most of us the UK will be the largest market and it's better to focus on doing well in that than going for the global option.

Mike

[Donna Kempster]

Yes Rich, our bunting, kids bedding and flags that's all. We were advised the cost differences and it just wasn't worth it! We do a small amount outside the UK but the costs of delivery to Australia etc (even Europe for larger orders) can be prohibitive from a customers point of view. Our bunting is quite heavy and therefore you can't send many strings by post before it gets to be over weight and has to go by courier. D

[pnagames]

thanks everyone

we are looking to sell to these countries through our stores in amazon / ebay (so no problems with confusion of GBP and USD)

our online store will remain as Europe only

i will have a word with our insurance company soon (they did a site visit today anyway)

[acompton]

I have also used Interparcel inside and outside of Europe. Most of 'western' Europe seems to come in around £14-22. Estonia does too (I haven't tried Latvia or the other one). Eastern Europe and the rest of the world gets really expensive. Strangely, Greece is in this band.

The standard insurance covers £50 worth of goods.
The extra insurance is £2 for £100 cover and £5 for £200 (from memory).

[chris ashdown]

Another point with the good old USA is that their custom declarations for manufactured textiles are very demanding and likely to hold up goods for days at customs, not to bad if just posted but really hard if using a courier or larger packet / parcel

Just try finding out country of origin for a jacket made of Nylon and Polyester Cotton, or Polyester cotton trousers that may have been made in China, India, Poland, Marocco or the UK depending on batch number and all purchased in the UK.You can lie but do you really want to get on the wrong side of US Government departments

[Kirk]

Also, American customer IME do seem to have an unrealistic idea of how much something costs to ship to them.

I find this to be the case with ALL customers now, regardless of where they are. Shipping has become such a significant expense in the last few years. In the US, I think Amazon, Best Buy and Overstock.com have the consumer conditioned to expect their entire order, regardless of size, to ship for $2.95 (sic).

On the other hand, every subset of customers has their own specific set of quirks. Once you learn them, you can do well.

• Customers in countries with VAT always ask you to make the customs value for less than half of the actual value of the order. (Sorry, no can do)
• Customers in Malaysia ask that I put invoice copies on the OUTSIDE of the package, while my customers in Singapore want the invoice copies only INSIDE the package. (Glad to do that)
• Anything to South America must be done by commercial carrier - FedEx, UPS, DHL, etc as the Postal Service in that part of the world is...ahem... "erratic"
• Retail customers in Canada only want things shipped via mail, while commercial customers only want UPS or FedEx.

We've done well with international trade, although each one of the bullet points above (and many others) were learned the hard way. Good luck to you!

[pinbrook]

don't forget differing formats for games etc in US etc.

We stopped selling to the US several years ago when we sold DVDs from our surfing site, despite saying they were PAL we still had orders from the US, we had to email each order to check they really wanted them, only to find they didn't want PAL, then we had to refund which cost us CC processing.

[pnagames]

don't forget differing formats for games etc in US etc.

We stopped selling to the US several years ago when we sold DVDs from our surfing site, despite saying they were PAL we still had orders from the US, we had to email each order to check they really wanted them, only to find they didn't want PAL, then we had to refund which cost us CC processing.

in ebay is fine as we will only sell our pc games and NDS/PSP which are region free

i dont know what happens in amazon. probably we will email the customer to make sure (in case they buy any other console game)

thanks for all the replies