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Comment by mind_heist | Hacker News Reader

- Well,I have a partial understanding of this. Its typical for people travelling back to South East Asian countries to buy stuff that are super expensive there ( like mentioned in the original explanation , MacBooks are expensive ; Xbox , Playstations , Premium Watches , Booze (due to local taxes) ; mostly electronics and high end fashion stuff.

- With respect to import taxes : You wont be stopped by the customs unless you are carrying a crazy amount of electronics ; Like if you carry a couple of laptops - and justify it as one for personal and one for work ; they let you go. With respect to this service , I guess its upto you to be cautious & decide how much to carry.

- And there are a lot of Duty free airports; And the purchase made at Duty free airports are mostly overlooked at the destination airport.

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What you've pointed out is what people do, but not what they are theoretically allowed to do :)

Transporting a MacBook, Xbox, PS4, etc. from the United States back to a South East Asian country (as you suggest), is illegal. For the casual traveler there probably isn't a great risk, since they can always claim it was an accident. But for the recurrent backpacker, the risks are potentially higher.

you dont know the german BGS ... if you dont have a receipt for anything electronic that doesnt look like its 5 years old you are basically fucked. additional to the tax you have to pay you get a hefty fee because its treated as tax evasion. you can do a lot of stuff ... but not tax evasion.

Hmm .. This is expected though! The customs in developed countries are far more stringent . But I m not sure if this is targetted at European customers at all . Is the price difference between USA and Europe big enough for any one to try this service ?

But thats not the case in developing countries. Products priced at an affordable cost in USA , could be insanely expensive in developing countries.

MBP Retina 15", top of the line $2,499.00 in the us, 2,499.00€ ($3,327.94) in germany . its exactly the savings range that they are targeting

Wow ! That's huge, I did not expect such a big difference between prices in Germany and USA . Thanks for pointing this out -

1. Are these due to local taxes in Germany ? 2. Is this price difference common in other parts of Europe as well ?

Import duties may be different if you're a business doing large quantities vs. a single person buying a single thing for personal use.

i just checked this particular item but all the countries that use € are all 2499€ and the others (uk, swe..) are about 2500€. i guess the difference here comes from the actual curreny differences.

i think its mostly taxes, because when i add the 19% VAT that i would have to repay when entering germany with a us bought laptop (i think laptops are toll free, not sure ... but some electronic devices have tolls) im at ~$3000

Don't forget trade within the EU is "free", so I - being located in the UK - could buy a laptop in Germany and import it free and legally (bar shipping costs). Therefore, the arbitrage would be simple and legal. Importing from the US, on the other hand, carries significant import charges as I found out the other day when I imported a BeagleBone Black.

Hmm.. But are the prices any different for products inside the EU ? Or are there any states that levy a lower purchase than others .

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