Hello,

I just moved to Zurich for work, and it was my understanding that you needed to claim all your household effects that would follow you later when you enter the country. When I passed through customs at the airport, they said they didn't deal with that (I had a detailed inventory for them). Does anyone know this process? Am I screwed now, and they will try to impose duty on my books and CDs (all old, 5 to 10 years) when the moving van shows up? I think the very LEAST one should be able to expect is that the bureaucrats know their own red tape!

Now I have absolutely no idea who to see about this, or what the process is, as I am doubtful that I can just import 30 cubic feet of boxes without some form of inspection. Of course, my understanding is they will clear customs in England, and then be shipped by van. Considering how easily things cross the border in the EU and between EU/Switzerland perhaps there is nothing to worry about on the Swiss end of things?

thanks for your time

my moving company arranged most of the forms for me, i had to fill some in, there is a 18.44 form, that i had to fill in about my effects, i dont think i have to pay duty as i have claimed everything as personal,

you must sign a dec saying, you owned everything for atleast 6months prior and will continue to use them after.

this should be done before the transit i think, and then they check the goods once they come over

Itys true customs at the airports dont deal with it . You need to keep your list of goods and when the moving company transport your goods , they will fill in a declaration and present customs with your list of goods. You will need to sign a declaration, which the moving company will supply and then present to customs.

You need not worry, you can import personal goods for up to 6 months after youve moved. Good luck with the move .

Thanks for the info. I feel better knowing I won't have to argue through red-tape. It does beg the question though why the customs officers at the airport didn't know this? Maybe they just couldn't be bothered talking to me although they were pleasant enough, especially after they realised they could ding me VAT for my laptop.

Thanks for all the Information. I'm going to be moving stuff over after I move into my apartment, and was going to start looking for info... Now I don't have to... Only difference is I probably won't use a moving company. Had nothing but trouble with them when moving from Singapore and Oregon before that.
All together now...

thanks for the post. i was wondering something similar myself. i heard that some agreements signed with EU states. does this mean that if you relocate from an EU country, you don't need to worry about 6 months etc.? or are there still restrictions?

The customs officers at the airport dont know this because they dont deal with imports of household goods, its a specialist dept within the customs.
The guys you see at the airport are concerned with smuggelers et al and not with general imports.

Whether you relocate from an EU country to Switzerland or not the 6 month rule still applies.
Within other EU countries there is still a time limit to import expensive goods, ie, a car , motorcycle etc etc, but no limit on personal effects.

why could they charge you VAT for you rlaptop? only if it was new. last time i bought over my laptop, PS2 about 5 games, hard drives and blah, i wasnt sure and went through and declared, was given a phamlet and told only new items if you owned it for a while then do even need to declare it and go through the 'no items to declare' line.

they only thing i would do is be sure you get all the right info and have all the right declarations and forms. you dont want to start on the wrong side of the customs process. the local Swiss embass/consulate should have all the info. good luck!

I went through this a couple of years ago. It is VERY, VERY important to have
a detailed list of what you are bringing and appear very organised. They basically
asked me a couple of questions and stamped the form without even looking
at my things.

A friend of mine showed up at the Swiss border with a truck and without
any inventory of what was in the truck. The customs guys made him unpack
the truck at the border for inspection causing a lot of inconvenience.

Our removalists handled the paperwork, and whilst it wasn't without a hitch, they did do an 'inventory' which satisfied the customs requirements.

Customs did open one box - they checked the one with the electricals I think - they seemed to know what they were targeting..everything else no problem...

We recently sent the entire encyclopaedia Britannica over. We had to re-pack it because the boxes were too heavy for print post, and all we had handy was wine boxes. Every single box was opened and checked (possibly looking for wine) and we even found someone's christmas card inside. We sent it on but too bad it was already January.

Because it was less than 6 months old. I knew about this ahead of time and expected it. In fact while the time period might be slightly different I think most countries do this. Here they are quite fair about it actually. They give you a receipt, and if you leave before 5 years, you get the VAT back. Frankly, I'm the first to pick on the stupidity that naturally arises in government bureaucracy, but this strikes me as exceedingly fair and more than could really be expected from them. They could take the money and just keep it.

I never checked if there is an exception for gifts. Sometimes there are exceptions of this sort so you don't get dinged crossing the border with your Xmas loot. My expectation of this however is that it would only be up to a certain amount, and perhaps things like major electronics might not be included. Perhaps someone else knows? Or more than likely, most people don't bother making a left and going through the customs part and just scurry right out into the terminal. Unfortunately, not my style, but more power to em if they're comfortable doing it. All my coworkers thought I was nuts for even bothering to go through the customs area. I figure if you don't respect the laws of the foreign country you reside in, you shouldn't be surprised if it bites you in the end...pardon the pun. For CHF45, it wasn't worth the potential problem.

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but...I like a cookie

hi,
It would be great if someone could shed some insight. I recently moved here form the uk and am looking to import some personal items from home (ie guitar, amp, books, small furniture etc)..i know that i can just fill in form 18.44 along with a list. But i dont want to use a moving company i just want to send these, parcel by parcel through Royalmail/Parcelforce, can anybody tell me if this is ok and what i need to do

thanks in advance

I sent 12 boxes of stuff from the Uk with parcel force. wrote on the form that it was household stuff, left the value blank and it got here within 5 days. Didn't hear anything from customs!!

Hi

Has anyone had this situation - and found a good way of dealing with it? I just got my watch repaired in the UK, and asked the repair company to ship it back to my home address in Switzerland.

A nice postman arrived at my apartment this morning, with the watch, and a customs bill for 109 CHF!!! (In fairness the repair itself plus service cost the equivalent of around 550 CHF).

The watch is really quite old - 6 years. Do I have any case to argue with the post office (I did not pay immediately, but asked for the collection slip to go and collect later on today) OR do I really have to pay 20% tax on a repair?

Any experiences or inputs welcome! For some reason I thought that a service, such as a repair, would not have duty imposed on it, but unless someone's got a different experience, I guess it's a lesson learnt ....