Brooks England, which suspended sales to UK customers buying products direct from its website following the end of the Brexit transition period, has resumed shipments to shoppers here – but is warning them that they will be liable for VAT and potential customs charges now that the country has left the EU, despite the products being made in the West Midlands.
As we reported in January, the company – founded in Smethwick almost 140 years ago and owned since 2002 by Italy’s Selle Royal – now fulfils orders made through its website via its parent company, meaning products are sent there for shipping, and it suspended orders from the UK following the end of the Brexit transition period on 31 December last year.
> Brooks England stops online sales of ‘Made in Britain’ saddles to UK shoppers – because of Brexit
In an email sent to customers this week, the company said that it is now shipping orders to the UK again, but highlighted that people here buying its saddles and other products from its website will have to pay import VAT and other potential levies and duties.
The email stated:
Orders from the UK have now resumed. However, there are important conditions to share with you before you place your order.
As you know, Brooks England is a part of Selle Royal Spa, and all online orders are shipped from Italy. Please consider then that any orders received by Selle Royal Spa will be subject to the terms and conditions of DAP Incoterms® 2020 rule.
In case of shipping to the United Kingdom, the price you pay to Selle Royal Spa will not include any relevant import customs duties, import VAT or any other applicable import levies. As the buyer, you will be required to pay any duties, taxes and/or levies upon arrival of your parcel at its place of destination, in order to have your order released from Customs. By placing your order, you also acknowledge and accept that you are responsible for checking if there is any specific rule or restriction applicable to the import of the goods into the UK.
As we are unable to advise you on the exact cost for the taxes and duties, we recommend contacting your local customs office or tax authority before proceeding with your order. For returns, we will refund the cost of the products and the shipping, but we cannot refund the taxes and duties that have already been paid to the customs office. Finally, please note that, in occasional cases, your parcel may be delayed by Customs and subsequent charges may be applied.
Due to new Brexit regulations, UK orders must meet a minimum of £135. Please note that the prices shown for orders to the UK do not include VAT. All Taxes and Duties must be paid to the courier upon delivery.
Thank you for your continued understanding and we look forward to serving your needs in the near future.
The advice only applies to products ordered direct from the company’s website; as Brooks England’s British distributor Extra UK made clear in January, the ones it supplies to premium dealers here are unaffected.
“UK distribution through Extra UK is unchanged,” the company said at the time. “Extra UK will continue to deliver Brooks England products to Brooks Premium Dealers throughout the UK and Ireland. UK consumers can use the Brooks England store locator to find a local stockist.
“Furthermore, we can confirm that UK-made Brooks England products are shipped directly from the Brooks England factory in Smethwick to Extra UK’s warehouse, and not via Selle Royal’s HQ in Italy,” it added.
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35 thoughts on “Caveat emptor: Brooks England resumes shipments to UK online customers, but warns they will have to pay Brexit duties”
Madness!!
Madness!!
It is madness! Also feels
It is madness! Also feels like in the intervening months, Brooks could have done something about the situation rather than just saying “Screw it, sales are back on but there’s a load of taxes to pay”.
They clearly have a UK distribution capability from their work with Extra so why not use it for direct sales?
Brexit is stupid but so is doing nothing about it for your customers.
I dont understand how theyve
I dont understand how theyve come up with their system either that then drops the VAT/import bit on a customs process you have to deal with, when other suppliers in the EU have adopted and are now happily just treating those bits as thats the dispatch to the UK cost they add on and deal with for you upfront.
we’ll see what happens next when the EUs implementation of vat rules finally come in July.
They’re claiming a vat refund
They’re claiming a vat refund when the goods leave the UK, in this case, and then UK purchasers have to repay it to reimport.
Why would they be paying VAT
Why would they be paying VAT for shipping from one part of the business to another?
AidanR wrote:
Because they’re in different VAT regimes. That’s how taxes work.
Dave Dave wrote:
… But the goods aren’t leaving the UK. They’re in Smethwick. They’re literally pocketing import charges they don’t need to pay. I could literally cycle to them in 30 minutes and collect an order, but on their website they’ll charge me as though its coming from Italy. Its madness.
If you buy as an individual
If you buy as an individual you will get the ones reimported from the online retail store. Go to a UK dealership and you get a UK one. It says this right there in the article. So no, they are not pocketing import charges, you made that bit up.
Jenova20 wrote:
Are they? I thought all product was shipped to selle’s distribution centre in Italy before being sent to consumers.
It does seem bonkers. Most of
It does seem bonkers. Most of the UK based retailers seem to have come up with solutions for shipping all inclusive to the EU. I presume it’s possible the other at around as well.
Brooks/Selle are making themselves look stupid, they should just shutdown UK direct sales and leave it to the UK retailers.
Large numbers of companys won
Large numbers of companys won’t ship or have a variety of differing rules on what they’ll do. And the next round comes in a few weeks when the EU change the VAT rules to those the UK implimented on Jan 1st. As for the comments about why ship from the UK to Italy and back, the Cambian saddles are made in Italy for a starter. With the current supply situation just be grateful you can buy anything from somewhere!
I think you are
I think you are misrepresenting the situation. No businesses are finding the situation simple, and many smaller ones have just given up on import/export with the EU.
“Happily” is not the right word.
“Happily” as in willing to be
“Happily” as in willing to be helpful, to be of assistance, something most companies who prioritise serving their customers do, as a matter of course,because that’s how they make more money by getting repeat custom.
I’ve bought items online from EU based companies since Brexit, expecting it to be some horrendously complex and horrible thing based on the impressions some paint of it, and have been pleasantly surprised it’s all worked quite seamlessly for me so far.
Maybe I’m just lucky and use companies that were willing to adapt for their customers and use reliable global logistics firms, whilst Selle Royal have taken this different approach & path, which only they can know if it’s the right thing for them or not.
Extra are a distie, they’re
Extra are a distie, they’re not set up for selling direct to the public. Same reason you can’t buy direct from Madison (except for clothing)
There’s a world of difference between dealing with a dealer network on credit terms and dealing with end consumers. Returns for starters, then add in stuff like cooling off periods, chargebacks, etc. None of that applies in B2B. Also, I’d imagine they want to protect their dealer network, or at least pay lip service to doing that. That’s quite common in the technology sector for example and B2C sales (which have higher margins for the producer) are a source of friction between disties/resellers and the manufacturers/publishers.
They’ve had five years to
They’ve had five years to come up with a plan to ship things made in England to customers who live in England.
I suppose warehouse staff are cheaper in Italy.
srchar wrote:
[I]“UK distribution through Extra UK is unchanged,” the company said at the time. “Extra UK will continue to deliver Brooks England products to Brooks Premium Dealers throughout the UK and Ireland. UK consumers can use the Brooks England store locator to find a local stockist.
[I]“Furthermore, we can confirm that UK-made Brooks England products are shipped directly from the Brooks England factory in Smethwick to Extra UK’s warehouse, and not via Selle Royal’s HQ in Italy,” it added.[/i][/i]
Seems like a plan to me.
That is not true.
That is not true.
There was 5 years of wrangling, but you may remember that the deal only became clear at the last minute, Christmas 2020. And it was nothing at all like the frictionless trade our lying Prime Minister promised.
It’s bad enough Johnson constantly telling lies, without other people misrepresenting the facts to let him off the hook.
The products are manufactured
The products are manufactured in the UK.
If Brooks had set up their website so that UK orders were fulfilled through their UK distributor then they would have been covered for any type of deal whatsoever.
Why they chose not to do so and why they’re now doubling down on that decision is a bit of a mystery.
I suppose the take home from
I suppose the take home from this is buy local and by this I mean from a British Web site.
VIPcyclist wrote:
Buy from a British retailer, which won’t rip you off and claim your order is travelling Europe, when it’s actually from down the road.
Its actually more difficult
Its actually more difficult than you’d think to work out if the website you’re buying from is actually in the UK/shipping from the UK.
Simply don’t buy via their
Simply don’t buy via their website seems to be the take home from this. Plus ffs, the extra environmental damage due to shipping the damn things to Europe before shipping them back.
That too.
I’d have thought there was
I’d have thought there was merit in a system that privileged buying a UK product in the UK via a UK retailer. But that’s not the drum they want to bang here on road.cc.
If only they had received a
If only they had received a bit more warning Brexit was going to happen. Oh…
The deal was signed just
The deal was signed just before christmas, so no, not a great deal they could do. No detail on what they needed to prepare for.
Why did they need detail?
Why did they need detail?
Setting up the website so that UK orders are fulfilled by their UK distributor would have covered them for all possible scenarios.
The fact that they haven’t managed to do this in 5 years reflects pretty poorly on Brooks.
The fault lies with the liars
The fault lies with the liars of Vote Leave and the Conservative & Brexit Party, for lying and lying and lying about what Brexit would entail.
That includes Johnson, Gove, Cummings, Stuart…the whole lot of them.
Brooks did not decide that the UK would leave the Single Market. Brooks didn’t choose to have import VAT and import duties added to their products. That’s the fault of Johnson’s Dishonest Mob.
HarrogateSpa wrote:
All true as far as it goes. It was however Brooks/Selle’s decision not to change their direct sales model to compensate though.
So, if I, based in the West
So, if I, based in the West Midlands, want to buy from this company, also based in the West Midlands, I’ll have to pay import duties for them to send it from Smethwick, also in the West Midlands, while they pocket a mythical import charge they aren’t actually paying or required to pay?
A: This is ridiculous and doesn’t sound legal
B: Boycott
No. Road.cc is shit stirring.
No. Road.cc is shit stirring. Read the last paragraph.
Indeed. Nothing to see here.
Indeed. Nothing to see here. Move on.
Well they aren’t shit
Well they aren’t shit stirring. You cannot purchase directly from Brookes without paying an import duty due to the way they distribute direct sales from their website.
The last paragraph is for UK distributors who use Extra (who I believe don’t sell direct to the public but are dealer suppliers). I suspect they could easily get around this with 2-3 additonal people based in Smethwick but I suspect they will only do that if they realise they are losing lots of money because of “Option B” in Jenova’s post.
The website is careful to say
SRS is careful to say that any “relevant” taxes are payable. Road.cc has amped that up to “will have to pay brexit duties”.
My understanding is that for EU origin product there are no import taxes or extra vat. You either pay VAT inclusive for orders up to ￡135 (and the seller pays the VAT to the UK, same as for a local supplier – but SRS don’t seem to want to be bothered with that) or you buy VAT exclusive over £135 and settle VAT on import.
I’d be surprised if UK origin product was treated any less favourably than EU origin, but of course they might never have imagined a UK manufacturer would be daft enough to ship from Smethwick to Selly Oak via Rome, so maybe there is an oversight there?
As to Brooks “England” stuff out of China, yes, there would be an issue if that was shipped via Italy. I understand that it would attract tariffs at both the EU and again at the UK borders.
It would be good if some proper journalism could actually be brought to bear on the situation. How much is just SRS not wanting to play by the new rules, and how much is genuinely unavoidable tax/tariffs in this situation? But all we get is road.cc’s political gripe. Plenty other organs for that if they don’t want to stick to cycling.
As of posting this is the
As of posting this is the 59th post on a subject that would have been irrelevant except the politicians currently in power lied during the Brexit campaign. What a waste of time and energy the Brexit sh1t show is. I don’t know anyone who has seen any benefit from it.
Apart from Johnson who needed
Apart from Johnson who needed it to become Prime Minister…