What Items are restricted?

[cormcvcr]

We are seriously thinking about taking a container with us now, rather than sharing one.

There are also some really good sales on at the moment and were thinking of buying some items of furniture in the sales and bringing them with us.

Ie. a leather suite, wooden bed etc......I am wanting to know from all you lovely people, if leather or wood products cause problems going through customs, or if these items would be okay.

the items would be arriving unused and still packaged (don't know if this helps or not)

but your information on this matter would be gratefully accepted.

many thanks x:p

[Libby1971]

Hi

You need to declare anything that is made of plant products anyway, which you know and the fact that the wooden bed would still be in packaging wouldn't cause any problems I wouldn't think - but I didn't bring anything new. We brought only one wooden sideboard and that went through fine.

I think though that there are some regulations concerning tax and you may have to pay some tax if the goods are clearly less than a year old. If in new packaging, then that would apply. I'm afraid I cannot be any more specific than that. Not much good really, then, am I? Sorry!

Libby

[The Monaghans]

I think Libby's right about the tax implications as it's ringing a definite bell with me. Can you not take the packaging off and smear a bit of jam on it to make it look "used"????

[louiesmum]

Hi
We just had a removal co. round, & was told wood is ok as long as its treated varnished waxed etc. its only if you bring untreated wood there would be a problem, no problem as far as I'm aware, with leather furniture. But I'm sure a removal Co. would be happy to tell you what you can/can't take, I was suprised to be told that you couldn't take wicker furniture & feather quilts/pillows. hope of some use, I'm sure if any of my info is incorrect someone else on PIA will know.

[Tracijbc]

Hiya,

It's a quandry that we are going through at the mo too. We had the guy from Pickfords round on Friday night and he told us that anything obviously new would incur extra tax, although, to be fair, he also said that if we "told" him it wasn't new, then how could he argue?? (wink wink!!). Seemed reasonable if it's not in a wrapper, they can't prove it's not new eh?

He did tell us though that any untreated wood products (like our CD storage boxes from IKEA) and wicker, cane etc would need to be fumigated at Port Adelaide, at an extra cost to us, so you need to work out if the item is worth the cost of fumigation or not.

There was also the usual stuff about OH having to clean his tools to show no vegetable matter or rust, and we both have to clean all our shoes etc for the same reason. A good soak in Jeyes fluid should do the trick, (just a wipe for the shoes though eh?).

Hope that helps, and if you want to know the full nitty gritty I do have a website address with all the restrictions on.

Cheers

Traci x

[cormcvcr]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I contacted our shipping company and they also said the stuff would be fine because it is pre packed with no signs of use, but said if we were buying new to get the stuff delivered to his premises as we could then get it vat free (17.5%) and pay on 10% gst on it when we get to adelaide, so still saving on the item and the tax.

So looks as though IT'S ALL GOOD!

Thanks again as always guys x

[BJF]

We bought wooden stuff over with us and customs wouldn't release our stuff until we had paid for these items to be treated, we just told customs that the RAAF were responsible for any charges incurred and they should contact them, the following day the removals phoned to say customs had released our container.

We were told outdoor furniture (table, chairs, kids slide, swing) was a big No-no, also we couldn't bring either of the two lovely Christmas door wreaths we had as they had pine cones on them. The removals also told us we had to remove the tyres from the pushbikes but we didn't, we decided if customs wanted them removing then they could remove them (can you tell that by this stage we were getting hacked off with rules?) we just scrubbed the tyres and bikes clean.

On the declaration form where it said 'any new items to declare (items less than 12 months old for tax purposes) we just wrote various Christmas presents from Christmas 2003, various items of clothing and shoes, various DVD's and CD's, and luggage. We figured as long as we wrote something in that bit they would be happy, nothing was questioned and no tax incurred because of these items listed.