Duty | Tax | Customs for International shopping {VAT refund}

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#1,381
A friend visiting UK from Hong Kong used the Chanel export service when in London, her items from Selfridges were shipped to her home address in HK less the tax with a £50 shipping fee. I think in total she saved around 14%? Great if your home country has very low/ no import fees. She only found out when the SA mentioned it to her.
 
#1,382
Kem45 said:
That makes me feel slightly better - maybe they have a backlog currently? When I was in Italy summer of 2021 I had my refund in about two weeks from GB, and I put it in the mailbox at the Florence airport.
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To close the loop on this, I had to email GB a second time after they never responded to my first inquiry. They wrote back to tell my I'd have my refund on Jan 5 - but when I checked my credit card I saw it had hit on Dec 28. About six weeks from time of purchase to refund and the website status never updated throughout the process - it went straight from customs validation needed to refund has been issued successfully. I think this actually worked slightly in my favor as the Euro has strengthened slightly against the dollar since I made my purchases and I got back a bit more than I was expecting :biggrin:

Still waiting on my Planet Payment refund, although the website says the form has been successfully received.
 
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#1,383
Kem45 said:
To close the loop on this, I had to email GB a second time after they never responded to my first inquiry. They wrote back to tell my I'd have my refund on Jan 5 - but when I checked my credit card I saw it had hit on Dec 28. About six weeks from time of purchase to refund and the website status never updated throughout the process - it went straight from customs validation needed to refund has been issued successfully. I think this actually worked slightly in my favor as the Euro has strengthened slightly against the dollar since I made my purchases and I got back a bit more than I was expecting :biggrin:

Still waiting on my Planet Payment refund, although the website says the form has been successfully received.
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That’s good news. Same here. I got my refund from Global Blue for the one I dropped off at the airport exactly 5 weeks. The status also went straight from Customs Validation Needed to refund has been issued. However, as for the one from Planet I got it within a week. Hope you get yours soon.
 
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#1,384
Has anyone experienced issues in mailing the tax free forms when you shopped in Europe?

Background: got my forms validated by customs however I mixed up the mailing envelopes —- I used Planet’s envelope to send 3 global Blue forms and 1 Planet form using Global Blue’s envelope.

I‘ve contacted both companies to advise about the situation. I really hope that the two can liaise with each other and help me with this else it’s over $1k worth of refund ‘wasted’ Surely Im not the first one to do this.
 
#1,386
maclover said:
Has anyone had a successful submission at the kiosk (green checkmarks) and had the Planet Payment status change
from: Your Tax Free form has been received successfully and we're processing your refund.
to: We are waiting to receive your stamped Tax Free form.
I've sent an inquiry already but wanted to see if anyone had a similar experience.

For reference, another VAT refund done at the same time with Planet has been paid (20 business days).
Global Blue was pretty quick, got my refund within a week.
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Just to give an update on this.. I have sent my inquiry through their tracking page and also reached out to them by email ([email protected]) and haven’t gotten any response back after weeks. Does anyone have any advice or other contacts I should reach out to? Chanel HQ?
 
#1,387
maclover said:
Just to give an update on this.. I have sent my inquiry through their tracking page and also reached out to them by email ([email protected]) and haven’t gotten any response back after weeks. Does anyone have any advice or other contacts I should reach out to? Chanel HQ?
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Planet Payment seems to be extremely delayed- I still hadn't gotten anything back on my card from my shopping trip in November, so I filled out the form on their website. I never heard anything so filled it out a few more times - they finally got back a few days ago responding to my inquiry from Jan 3 saying they had marked my refund as a priority for Feb/March. The trip where I bought the item was in early November and the tracking on the website has said that my forms were received and processed, but yet to be paid since about two weeks after I returned from the trip in mid-Nov.
 
#1,388
Kem45 said:
Planet Payment seems to be extremely delayed- I still hadn't gotten anything back on my card from my shopping trip in November, so I filled out the form on their website. I never heard anything so filled it out a few more times - they finally got back a few days ago responding to my inquiry from Jan 3 saying they had marked my refund as a priority for Feb/March. The trip where I bought the item was in early November and the tracking on the website has said that my forms were received and processed, but yet to be paid since about two weeks after I returned from the trip in mid-Nov.
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I finally received my refund this week - just over 2 months. It took about 4 times filling the form to get a response. They initially told me they were waiting to receive my form (their reply below).. FYI I validated them at the kiosk and the track status even showed it was processed and to be paid within 30 days, but then the status changed to waiting for forms.. Luckily I had a screenshot of the “processed” status and asked them to look into it. They got back to me after that they checked their database and processed it as a priority for me. I think you should get yours soon!

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#1,389
Hi everyone!

Can anyone share their experience on how to claim VAT when purchasing in Athens? After Athens, I will be flying to Crete. From Crete, I have a flight at 7AM, and a layover in Zurich for 3.5 hours then back to the US. Where should I go to customs?

I read Zurich isn't in the EU and I should processed VAT in the last EU destination, which in this case, is in Crete.

Thanks!
 
#1,390
@grlnextdoor you have to do the VAT at the last EU country - the reason being they need you to be in the airport and have a departing flight/proof that the item is being taken back to another country. I think I did mine in athens, but all the airports will have someone staffed at the VAT return office. Sometimes if its off hours (like 2 -5AM) it will seem like no one is there, but theyll come when paged. A lot plenty of extra time, particularly if you bought really pricy items (10K+) I noticed they scrutinize quite a bit more. Take a photo of the receipts before you drop them, just in case :) enjoy
 
#1,391
Planet Payment-

Can anyone share their experience of how long it took Planet Payment to register the tax refund form in their system? I mailed my VAT refund from Zurich's airport to the office in Greece on May 19. I've been checking the website and it still says "We are waiting to receive your stamped Tax Free form."
 
#1,392
It hasn’t even been a month yet. PP refunds can easily take up to two (Significant more delayed than Global Blue).
Question, did you have to see a customs officer or did the machine give you an automatic approval? For some reason, the latter seems to register much later. If it’s still not showing as received online in two weeks (a month), I’d follow up.
 
#1,393
a_b_c said:
It hasn’t even been a month yet. PP refunds can easily take up to two (Significant more delayed than Global Blue).
Question, did you have to see a customs officer or did the machine give you an automatic approval? For some reason, the latter seems to register much later. If it’s still not showing as received online in two weeks (a month), I’d follow up.
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Thanks for your response! I left from a small airport in Greece and layovered in Zurich. The small airport in Greece did not have a machine. The customs officer stamped the form. I wasn't able to mail it from Greece because the airport did not have a mailbox. I went to a Planet Payments desk in Zurich and the agent mailed it for me.
 
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