Now, this is a story of me going to have make first time customs declarations in Finland.
Now, as you may be aware, or may not be (then you are now); Finland has quite strict customs, and laws about it. It is not a problem most of time, firstly it only goes for anything that comes OUTSIDE of European union, and second it is completely random what packets they pick up for declaration.
In this case, it is a Anime Figurine, and even better, it is not for me - It is ones my friend ordered through me, because number two that sucks in Finland, is very limited amount of banks supporting online payments - half of "Visa Electron" cards do not support online transactions, (when marketing says they all SHOULD) - my bank and card is a rare one - they DO support it, while my friend's does not.
Because hobbylink japan does not give me option to charge from my card and send it to different address, everything he orders through me still come first to my address. To this date, I have had to make 15 minute walk to nearest post office when anything arrived, and call my friend to pick up his shite from my place. (incidentally, everything I ever ordered from DealExtreme is even better, they have fit to my post box, what a joy)
Well, this time instead of normal "Large Sized letter" note to post box, i get this note inside a plastic cover with stamp from customs, and immediately was going "uh oh" - after pondering this postal declaration and having the customs stamp, I concluded that I need to go to the customs noted in stamp, what was in harbor, granted only 15 minutes with bus and small walk (in the end) but still bit more pain to get to.
Real kicker was fact that it was only open on weekdays from 8am to 16:15pm - Now that is quite a timeframe, even considering that I am on vacation, I get up about 11am.
So, I had called my friend over, we were getting ready, I needed to get my Passport (only valid ID I have at moment), The receipt that I needed to print out for "just in case", the note I got from postal office, and also my friend had some amount of cash because I was thinking there was some Tax to pay for (since customs page said that anything over worth of >10€ can be written as taxable)
We make our small crusade to harbor, stopping near the place, walking to this industrial area where we FINALLY faced the Customs' place.
We go inside, and first thing is face a machine to print your queue number... oh boy, I pick up the "post packets" one, and see I am 217 on line. I also accidentally pressed other one what was not right thing for that and it was number 512. I was weirded out - as I soon learned, the freakin' customs had different number for every different kind of service, while they flashed 500+ numbers for Service place 6, the Place 9 what was meant for postal checks (you know, one I needed to declare) is deserted.
There seems to be only one person taking in other matters, while there is almost no one around doing the other stuff. People are just sitting and waiting... for a LONG time to add. Finally it seems that import/export matters get cleared away, so the older woman doing the stuff at place 6 goes outside, takes long smoke or whatever, is outside for notably long time anyway, comes back inside, and finally presses the button for someone to get finally get their postal pack.
Long story shortened, Two guys before me, there was another person who entered the reception table (totals of two now taking in customers) - and I got this grumpy old guy.
As I showed my note, the guy only said "let's go get it them" - in grumpy manner to add, nothing sort of positive tone in his voice, we go into hallway behind the reception desks, and from there to a storage room full of packets, and one desk with a packet opening knife and other stuff.
The guy takes my note, checks it, goes over to one wooden shelf, and points at one pack, what is already familiar to me. He points me to come and pick it up, and place it on the desk in same room.
He goes through stuff, first asking me "what's inside?" - First bone in my throat "Well, A plastic figure, toy-like" I answer "and it resembles Human?" "yes, sort of" I answer.
So He asks is there a price receipt for it, I show the e-mail I printed, he check it and is like "6,800?" I was "in japanese yen" - He the comes back "What is it about in euros?" In this part, voice inside my head yelled "YOU ARE THE FREAKIN' CUSTOMS GUY" and my mouth said "well..." *I start to take out my iPod touch and booting convertor app* "Well it is about 50 euros"
The the guy is "ok, just open it then" and now I am going "oh my..." inside head as I open the pack.
That is what the guy was now looking at, and to say least, I was little "going inside my shell" - It was a bit embarrassing to say least.
Then the guy goes "well, it seems it's really nothing valuable enough so I am just going to write it off and thats it" Me who was expecting something of 60 euros in value to be noted as 20 euros of tax at least was "And thats it?" - So I gave my old name under the paper, guy took it, and let me take my (Friend's) packet outside the room, back to the lobby where my friend was waiting, and as I hand over the packet I go about how freakin' embarrassing the whole ordeal was.
So, long story short, I am quite Happy I do not need to make these trips to customs much, since they really do take only few random packets. The pictures was taken back in my place to show the thing and two.
So, that is how customs in Finland, I hope NOBODY ELSE here needs to stand same kind of stuff.
Now, as you may be aware, or may not be (then you are now); Finland has quite strict customs, and laws about it. It is not a problem most of time, firstly it only goes for anything that comes OUTSIDE of European union, and second it is completely random what packets they pick up for declaration.
In this case, it is a Anime Figurine, and even better, it is not for me - It is ones my friend ordered through me, because number two that sucks in Finland, is very limited amount of banks supporting online payments - half of "Visa Electron" cards do not support online transactions, (when marketing says they all SHOULD) - my bank and card is a rare one - they DO support it, while my friend's does not.
Because hobbylink japan does not give me option to charge from my card and send it to different address, everything he orders through me still come first to my address. To this date, I have had to make 15 minute walk to nearest post office when anything arrived, and call my friend to pick up his shite from my place. (incidentally, everything I ever ordered from DealExtreme is even better, they have fit to my post box, what a joy)
Well, this time instead of normal "Large Sized letter" note to post box, i get this note inside a plastic cover with stamp from customs, and immediately was going "uh oh" - after pondering this postal declaration and having the customs stamp, I concluded that I need to go to the customs noted in stamp, what was in harbor, granted only 15 minutes with bus and small walk (in the end) but still bit more pain to get to.
Real kicker was fact that it was only open on weekdays from 8am to 16:15pm - Now that is quite a timeframe, even considering that I am on vacation, I get up about 11am.
So, I had called my friend over, we were getting ready, I needed to get my Passport (only valid ID I have at moment), The receipt that I needed to print out for "just in case", the note I got from postal office, and also my friend had some amount of cash because I was thinking there was some Tax to pay for (since customs page said that anything over worth of >10€ can be written as taxable)
We make our small crusade to harbor, stopping near the place, walking to this industrial area where we FINALLY faced the Customs' place.
We go inside, and first thing is face a machine to print your queue number... oh boy, I pick up the "post packets" one, and see I am 217 on line. I also accidentally pressed other one what was not right thing for that and it was number 512. I was weirded out - as I soon learned, the freakin' customs had different number for every different kind of service, while they flashed 500+ numbers for Service place 6, the Place 9 what was meant for postal checks (you know, one I needed to declare) is deserted.
There seems to be only one person taking in other matters, while there is almost no one around doing the other stuff. People are just sitting and waiting... for a LONG time to add. Finally it seems that import/export matters get cleared away, so the older woman doing the stuff at place 6 goes outside, takes long smoke or whatever, is outside for notably long time anyway, comes back inside, and finally presses the button for someone to get finally get their postal pack.
Long story shortened, Two guys before me, there was another person who entered the reception table (totals of two now taking in customers) - and I got this grumpy old guy.
As I showed my note, the guy only said "let's go get it them" - in grumpy manner to add, nothing sort of positive tone in his voice, we go into hallway behind the reception desks, and from there to a storage room full of packets, and one desk with a packet opening knife and other stuff.
The guy takes my note, checks it, goes over to one wooden shelf, and points at one pack, what is already familiar to me. He points me to come and pick it up, and place it on the desk in same room.
He goes through stuff, first asking me "what's inside?" - First bone in my throat "Well, A plastic figure, toy-like" I answer "and it resembles Human?" "yes, sort of" I answer.
So He asks is there a price receipt for it, I show the e-mail I printed, he check it and is like "6,800?" I was "in japanese yen" - He the comes back "What is it about in euros?" In this part, voice inside my head yelled "YOU ARE THE FREAKIN' CUSTOMS GUY" and my mouth said "well..." *I start to take out my iPod touch and booting convertor app* "Well it is about 50 euros"
The the guy is "ok, just open it then" and now I am going "oh my..." inside head as I open the pack.
That is what the guy was now looking at, and to say least, I was little "going inside my shell" - It was a bit embarrassing to say least.
Then the guy goes "well, it seems it's really nothing valuable enough so I am just going to write it off and thats it" Me who was expecting something of 60 euros in value to be noted as 20 euros of tax at least was "And thats it?" - So I gave my old name under the paper, guy took it, and let me take my (Friend's) packet outside the room, back to the lobby where my friend was waiting, and as I hand over the packet I go about how freakin' embarrassing the whole ordeal was.
So, long story short, I am quite Happy I do not need to make these trips to customs much, since they really do take only few random packets. The pictures was taken back in my place to show the thing and two.
So, that is how customs in Finland, I hope NOBODY ELSE here needs to stand same kind of stuff.
