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Dear All, This is my first post in FPN. Being a fountain pen lover, I have tried to buy pens from different sources. I found that ebay is a good place to get a fair deal on pens. I use credit card for payment via paypal account. Till now I've got around 8-10 pens from abroad as of now. These costs upto maximum upto 25 USD. In order to buy premium pens, I checked the govt portal for customs. Which says customs duty is applicable for fountain pens above 100$. I would like to know your experience while importing a premium pen from abroad. 1. Did you have to pay any customs duty for any pen? 2. How did you pay such customs duty 3. Please mention the original price of pen and customs duty so that they can be compared. 4. Please share if any bad experience happened. This will help newbies like me to add some romance to the love for FP. Thanks, Aniruddha

Sorry if this is in the wrong section, please move if it is, thank you! Are there any German users here who have ordered pens from Japan? I am thinking about ordering a Pilot pen on German eBay, but by a Japanese seller. It is so much cheaper than here, but of course taxes and customs ("Zollgebühren") have to be added (the seller says it is not included in price). Do you know how much I have to add for custom, taxes, Einfuhrsteuer, shipping company handling fees? I could not find "Füllfederhalter" (fountain pen) on the German customs catalog. The pen will be about 230-240 EUR with free shipping from Japan. I want to figure out if it is cheaper after all with all those extra costs (and the hassle driving to the customs office, filling out all these forms etc.) Thank you for sharing your experiences!

I don't know why, but thread about my mobile application "My fountain pens" was deleted. Let's try again: This app lets you manage your fountain pen collection. Data fields: Manufacturer, Model, Color, Filling system, Year of production, Pen length, Nib material, Nib size, Nib stroke, Personal rating, Description, Notes, Images, buy & sell info: name, date, price, notes Mandatory fields for pen data: manufacturer, model and filling system. Everything else is up to you. Make backup (XLSX format) and share file via Dropbox, Google drive... Use Microsoft Excel or Apple Numbers to edit backup file, then import backup data on one or several devices. You can find app here (Android) and here (iPhone): Screenshots: http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/V1_2_pen_list.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/5503_new1.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/5504_new2.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/5505_new3.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/5506_new4.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/V1_2_settings.png http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/backup.png Last version: V1.2. What's new? * thumbnail picture of your pen in the main pen list * follow pen-related YouTube channels: you can make your YT channels list. http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/V1_2_yt.png * import data from Jonro's Fountain Pen Database Thread about Jonro's FPD is here: https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/29267-fountain-pen-database-available-for-download/ http://www.lvbsx.com/Download/MFP/www/V1_2_jonro_input.png Your suggestions are greatly appreciated! Disclaimer: I am the author of “My Fountain Pens” application. Very important: you can disable ads: Settings -> Support Us -> Disable Google AdMob (free of charge) Best, Anes

Baoer, Jinhao and Hero pens can be found with ease, but brands like Wing Sung, Moonman etc are almost impossible to find. I really want to get a Wing Sung 699 and a Moonman M100, but the price of shipping is more than one and a half times the pen itself. Please suggest me sources from which I could buy Chinese pens for a reasonable price.

Hey All, I have a number of other hobbies that exist due to small-scale makers and sellers who're all having a heck of a time over the requirements of the new VAT Import Tax Laws introduced by the British. A good number of them are having to refuse to ship to buyers in the U.K. from now on due to the difficulties imposed by the new laws. I was wondering if anyone had any knowledgeable insights into how this will effect the purchasing of fountain pens from the likes of Ratnamson, ASA and Ranga from now on? Perhaps even, being proactive about it, is there anyone in this community of pen aficionados who has the required expertise and generosity of time to perhaps advise Indian pen makers on the new demands of trading with the British and how to best deal with them? Hope everyone is keeping well, 'Rewpert. P.S. - If we could all stay polite and keep politics out of this thread, that would be kind. The FPN is proving to be a quite safe haven from the discourse. There's plenty of room elsewhere on the internet where we can all each other 'Mopheads', 'Brexiteers', and 'Remoaners'.

Does anyone know where one can order Visconti pens in India and who carries them? Trying to import them personally seems like a massive gamble.

Hey everyone. I'm in a bit of a quandary. I've been looking at the Pilot Custom 74 demonstrator in blue, fine nib, for quite some time. I know it has been mentioned multiple times by Brian Goulet (I'm not affiliated with any supplier/retail company) as being one of his favorite pens. I like how they bundle it with the blue Noodler's ink, which after sampling I really want. So here's the deal. I can buy the pen on Amazon/ebay for about half the price. Money is an extremely important factor in my decision or I wouldn't even hesitate. Am I better off going through a trusted and known store or is spending almost half worthwhile? I need to add that the Japanese imports either don't have a converter or only come with the con-50, and I would buy a con-70 to add to the pen. The con-70 is $11.00 on Amazon. Please help me.

How often do people get charged on ordering from Japan to a UK address? I've just bought my first Japanese pens, to a total of around $630. How likely is it that I'll have to pay customs/excise, import VAT?