Originally Posted by belfast-biker
Hi there - thinking of a folder, and see more and more nice things about the Swift.... my question is this - did you get hit with any import charges on the way back from the States? I figure that a nice trip to NYC and WAshington would nearly pay for itself (!) if I got one of these things at source without import fees....
Cheers!
Sorry about the delayed reply - I've been travelling (sadly without the bike) for the last few weeks.
I got hammered by customs importing my Swift and paid about £180 in total I think...but with the decent dollar exchange, it was ok. and obviously Peter @ Swift didn't charge US sales tax.
Buying it out there would be ok, but obviously you would be 'breaking the law' if you bought it back into the UK and didn't pay sales tax.
If you do shipping, pay the extra and get Priority US Postal (insist on a tracking number(, or even better, use UPS, Fedex etc. - I don't rate the USPS service - my Swift was severely delayed, and I couldn't figure out where in the system it was (to be fair, this was probably a UK postal issue, because of the tax -but I couldn't 'find' the bike)...
Let us know how you get on.