Anyone know the legalities of shipping wine to UK?
I want to send a gift parcel to my mum-in-law in England. I always send her parcels via USPS, but the information they provide as far as what is legal and what isn't is very vague. Has anyone out there done this before? If so, any advice as to how to go about getting it to her it without any issues?
Tagged with: england • parcels • usps
Filed under: All Things Wine
Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!
The only legality regarding UK law is payment of UK tax. We have no problems in personal wineshipping.
If it is just one wine bottle I would get a single polystyrene bottle mailer and send it via regular mail as an 'unsolicited gift'.
If you want to send more, then I suggest you make quite certain that the same wine is not already available on the UK market. If it is, it will be cheaper all round to order via the web from a UK company for delivery to your mum-in-law.
The problem is UK taxes on wine are high, and you don't want your mum-in-law to be hit by a tax demand from the shipper (who will also add on a huge 'administration fee.' UK tax is not only duty plus wine tax, but then 17.5% VAT is added on top (including the other taxes, i.e. its a tax on tax)
Look at sites like http://www.majestic.co.uk, http://www.vinappris.com and http://www.oddbins.co.uk & http://www.everywine.co.uk for wine vendors that deliver nationally
If you want discuss suitable wines etc feel free to contact me via my profile