Importing a Thinkpad from the US..

[dmccart]

Hi,
just wondering has anyone here imported a Thinkpad from the US.
With the dollar and the fact that prices in Europe are higher anyway I was thinking it might be worth ordering a thinkpad from the US.

A few things put me off though :

1: Warranty ? What happens with an American laptop if its DOA in europe and also what is the story with the ongoing warranty?

2: Delivery: Can couriers be trusted to deliver a laptop in one piece?

What happens if its damaged and the courier says it was
shipped that way and the supplier says it was damaged in
transit?

3. Customs : I presume I have to pay but looking at some courier sites
they charge quite a bit for duty handling outside of the duty.
Any advice here would be appreciated.


I'm in Switzerland (but looking to get it shipped here or to Ireland (if duty is better) as thats where I'm from originally).

Amyone have any experience in this? If you have any advice, I'd appreciate it.
Thanks,
Denis

[k3nnis]

HI Denis.

I'll share my experiece with you. I am from sydney, australia and i ordered the T42 from bill owner of this site and he is from florida usa. Shipped it via fedex, and when it got to me, it was in perfect condition. I got taxed about 10% not sure about the duties in ireland or switzerland though. Good thing is that fedex handles all the duties for you.

Also the power supply on the thinkpad is 100V-240V so no problems there.

Cheers.
Kenn.

[dmccart]

Thanks for the info. Thought the power wouldn't be a poblem. Did you get the recovery cds to install windows again with the laptop? I ask as I may stick linux on it at some point and want a way to restore if things go wrong.

Also what kind of warranty comes with the laptop? Is it worldwide or limited to US?

How much did shipping cost including duty handling charges etc. (If you don't know thats alright)

[k3nnis]

Hi Denis.

Not a problem. Fedex is roughly US$120 for me to australia. Now regarding the tax, i got taxed around US$100 or less, the declared value was US$800 so.... It really depends on your country and their customs laws.

In regards to warranty, its 3 years i think for warranty , it has international warranty too but i am not 100% sure how it works. I think you can check the warranty status of the thinkpad on ibm website by using the serial number.

I didn't get recovery cds but you can create it yourself on the windows xp that came with it. in the start menu->access ibm->create recovery disks, 7 cds in total.

Cheers.
Kenn.

[ziggetty]

Hi Denis,

just done it. I am in Holland and ordered a T42P (2373kxu) by bill.
Paid $135 for shipping and asked bill to check machine before shipping.

maybe not the lowest price. But very good communications.
And a lot of info on this board. In my opinion a very good road to follow.
Ordered half november, and with a little delay for the moneytransfer it
arrived beginning of december.

My bank charged me EURO 8,50 for the wiretransfer to the US.
(this is very low compared to many other banks)

To holland:

import-charges there are not.
only VAT (19%),
but because it went to my own company VAT would be recovered.

FEDEX contacted me for my VAT-number. In the end nothing happened.
The parcel went through France(paris) and arrived in Amsterdam as an
inter-europe parcel.
(without a vat number it probably can be faked, although this would be fraude)
Better if you are liable for VAT to let declare a lower value by the sender.

Further only had to search for a european power-cord in my basement.
Warrenty is global.
i ordered some parts online(RU keyboard, about 40 euro),which arrived today and
was a good experience.

The recovery cd's i burned myself. It is always at least a 2 disk set(7 on cd),
from which the first is small enough to fit on cd.
As i have the multiburner, i burned the first on a cd-r and the second on a dvd-r

[JohnDrake]

It would be advised to call IBM Service for the country you are in, and register the machine type/serial number so warranty service (if needed) would be relatively painless.

Keep all purchase documentation to prove warranty eligibility, in case there is an issue...

[ian]

I bought my CWU from Bill (who else?!) in June - I saved 2000€ over the price I should have paid here in France (Yes, 2 THOUSAND)

I sent Bill a wire and he FedEx'd the machine - arrived in France a couple of days later - FedEx called me to ask if I'd be prepared to pay the VAT - obviously - and a day later the machine was delivered - I gave FedEx a cheque for the VAT and that was it - 10 minutes later I was learing about access connections...

This is quite legal - I even checked with customs here - they don't bother with a customs charge, simply the VAT. So you pay the US price, plus VAT which is based on the price on the paperwork (I'll let you read between the lines) plus the shipping. As I've already mentioned, the same unit bought in France was a lot more than I paid for mine. Warranty is identical (aside from the 30 day return) and is worldwide.

[gen2doggy]

Hi,

I live in UK and am also considering buying from the USA

Based on this info...
http://www.out-law.com/php/page.php?pag ... &area=news

...you dont pay duty, although the VAT will be added by customs, so you'll get an invoice for that.

I cannot believe the price differences on IBM's site between US and UK. I also cannot believe how poor the experience is on the UK ibm site compared to the US - the 'find a dealer' seems to leave some very poor choices in terms of suppliers.

More info at http://hmce.gov.uk

Great forum BTW, thanks.