Sales to Germany recycling/packing fee implemented July 22.2022

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  • 18 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • That's a good reason to not sell internationally. Just more taxation, and now people outside the country have to pay taxes to the country.
  • Germany Packing Act.
    Correction: Start date July 1, 2022
  • I agree, Michael (well, I quit international sales a while back). This from Germany; UK putting the burden of VAT on our shoulders; UPU/USPS making it cost-prohibitive to ship international.
    Who and what is next?
  • edited April 2022 2 LikesVote Down
    not to defend Germany but this does not really concern stamp sellers. As for the VAT tax - it is paid by the Germany, most EU, Australia and UK citizens. Ebay collects this now-a-days as it applies to each country. This is charged to the buyer. what this amounts to is a tariff to prevent overseas non EU buying. :-) As for any items in envelopes, like stamps most misses customs. so Foreign Customs just loves Ebay as they collect for them, everything even $1 items!! I have to applaud the USA for not retaliating against these anti trade policies. If we did charge the USA buyers to buy from EU as they do to us.. it would almost stop international outgoing trade , imo.
  • edited April 2022 1 LikesVote Down
    I might add, i can ship a stay flat up to 6 ounces to most EU or UK for $13 with tracking and insurance included. this is an Ebay service and I assume most private carriers offer similar? the VAT tax is automatically collected by Ebay so the customs is a bit easier and quicker. no need to inspect if shipped with ebay collected VAT. Just saying, a lot of the shipping has actually went way down for USA sellers of stamps. you can now get tracking free on a letter with stamp contents for 53cents to USA destinations. Add that to the free shipping supplies.. I was paying uline $50 for a box of 100 stayflats about monthly.. i get them free now. the mailing label covers the branding :-)
  • RE: Letter Post.

    After contacting the German license company " Lizenzero". The following info was received.

    Notice; Letter Post is not exempt all sales packing has a fee obligation.

    “Lizenzero” info.
    thank you for your e-mail and your interest in our service! We are happy to share more information and helpful instructions on compliance with regard to the German Packaging Act with you in the following:

    Basically, the following rule of thumb applies with regard to the obligations under the German Packaging Act (VerpackG):

    Every company is subject to licensing all their sales packaging (product packaging, shipping packaging, service packaging) that ends up as waste at the German private end consumer with a dual system if it:

    • fills this packaging
    • commissions the filling of the packaging (fulfilment) or
    • imports packaged goods

    Important to know: There are no exceptions! The VerpackG obligations apply from the first packaging and regardless of the size of the company. This means that airmail letters are also affected.

  • This law applies only to Business to Business and Business to Consumer shipments, right? So, I can see where stamp orders to Germany will then be shipped, not by John Doe Stamp Company, but simply by John Doe.
  • edited April 2022 3 LikesVote Down
    Are businesses.shipping to Germany getting a commission for essentially collecting taxes for the Federal Government?
    No.
    Will Tante Elle be fined for sending a Christmas card back to the old country?
    No.
    If I'm a small stamp dealer who might send 6 orders to Germany in a year, are they coming to get my fat kazakis?
    Hey, come and get me.....
    Crap like this applied to small/tiny business is ridiculous and essentially commercial censorship. I feel the same way about the USPS edict to charge letter-sized orders as parcels. I recently recieved a letter-sized order from Australia, WITH a customs form. Postage was AU$3.40. USPS tells me if I sent the same back to Australia, US postage would be $7.00+.
    Laws and regulations like these choke the life out of small commerce between nations.
  • The law isn’t anything about Tante Elle and her Christmas cards, to begin with. It is about business merchandise not personal correspondence.
  • I should have been less murky. That Christmas card would likely create as much or more waste than a sheet of paper and a few glassines.
  • I agree Phil, its pretty simple really.. you ignore the idiots there in Germany. This is all about continuing the process of Hidden tariffs that are disguised. Not that any can not see this. The worse they can do to a USA citizen is steal the merchandise. At that point simply block Germany from any future shipments and don't buy german products like Cars.. LOL :-) one hassle from them to me will result in a ban.
  • edited April 2022 2 LikesVote Down
    But, wait . . . It gets worse.
    France and Spain have similar laws, and their licensing fees are killers of micro businesses. While Germany's fee starts at 6 Euros a year for the lowest amount of packaging; France charges 80 Euros; and Spain, a whopping 600 Euros a year.

    Italy has packaging laws also: All packaging sent to Italian customers must bear an alpha-numeric code that identifies the type of material from which the packaging is made, in order to aid in recycling.

    I've written to one of the companies (ecosistant) that aids businesses in complying with these laws (explaining about the typical packaging of stamp sales) asking if this type of packaging falls under these laws. I'll let you know if they bother with a response.

    The ecosistant website has several articles about these packaging laws for different countries, on their website: https://www.ecosistant.eu/en/packaging-law-spain/
  • Hey, Guys You shouldn't worry too much about the Foreign Governments, but you should worry about The US Government. Why? Acting as an Agent for a Foreign Government is ILLEGAL without Consent from the State Department. So ignore them you are protected from doing this by Uncle Sam.
  • edited April 2022 2 LikesVote Down
    well Spain and Italy are on my permanent do not ship to list.. but this has nothing to do with packaging! :-) Italy- they cant even get a letter out in Italy under 2 months and the last one was moldy water stained. Spain appears to be the EU theft center.
  • Apparently someone in Italy can deliver mail promptly, but no one knows how to scan it in the US, Italy or any other country it passed through. For the past 10 days I have been sweating because I made the mistake of expecting mail placed in a drop box located at a postal annex would be processed correctly. I mailed a large envelope with a prepaid shipping label with tracking sent at package rates with the proper customs form attached and sent it insured. According to USPS tracking, this label has been created, but is yet to enter the postal system. When I contacted the PO complaining it hadn't been scanned, they said mail gathered from the drop box is simply sent as either a large flat or letter not checked to see if it is being sent as a package; however someone down the road would scan it into the system.

    My customer was very happy to receive it so fast. He said normally mail going through customs generally takes 4 to 6 weeks; however this envelope with customs form attached never went through customs. The buyer wants me to send his next order the same way, but I declined; however next time I will hand it to the mail clerk and watch them scan it. No more drop box mail for me.
  • Ted Tyszka. Thanks for the great info. https://www.ecosistant.eu/en/packaging-law-spain/
    Please keep us updated...

    From ecosistant ... website, informing +_ 20 Eur countries working or have implementing Fee/Tax on all.. online sales.

    As I understand from escosistant information. When ship, each Envelope/parcel has to be weighted and info sent to ecosistant, shipper/sellers will receive a registration/confirmation number.
    I checked the fee packing fee/tax for Germany.
    Fee/Tax 1 year. total,10 Kg Packing material, paper. $ 12.00.
    Fee/Tax for 20 EUR countries. $ +_420.00
  • Additional EUR/German. Packing Act. ( Sales to Europe ).
    https://activate.reclay.de/activate_germany_english/
  • I got a reply from ecosistant. Predictably, they are loathe to provide answers to such specific inquiries unless you have subscribed to their service. This is the beginning of their reply:

    Dear Ted Tyszka,

    the laws generally apply to every seller who sells products to consumers.
    With our digital service you can easily check if you need to fulfill any obligations.

    Here's an overview of what you can expect from the digital service: (blah blah blah)
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