Mattel Creations price scam

[Warriah']

So as we all know Mattel Creations shifted its pricing system for foreigners to include customs/tax etc. At least that’s what we were told.

During the BOGO deal going on the prices finally started looking attractive so I ordered a couple things in separate orders. One of which came with no issues, but I just got hit today with a £42 tax bill on a £69 order I placed with MC.

Not only are we being lied to about WHY they’re charging foreigners more, but MC will declare the value of your item on the customs form to be almost 4 times higher than it even is so you have to pay more. This order was below the threshold for VAT (£135 is the allowance on imports), and even if it wasn’t £13 would have been the VAT.

There are shady things going on with Mattel Creations and I thoroughly recommend avoiding them.

[BoneCrunchingCustoms]

How would they know if you received a bill or not

[Warriah']

Dec 22, 2023 6:37:00 GMT -5 BoneCrunchingCustoms said:

How would they know if you received a bill or not

Mattel includes VAT in their pricing when you check out. If you pay $100 for an item on the store living in the US, we’ll be charged about £95 (about $120) as it includes tax. Even on items that aren’t high enough to legally qualify to be charged VAT on imports.

For any other company that taxes you on checkout (for example amazon). They take the tax you’ve paid and pay it to the UK government for you.

So the fact that I’ve received a bill means that they have declared the items value when sending it. So they would have known I’d receive a bill. If they take the tax beforehand they’re required to send that money to the UK gov.

Granted they were not obligated to tax me as the contents of the order didn’t meet the minimum threshold for imports.

So what they’ve done is me twice. By overcharging me 20% on my order, and then lying to the courier about the value of the contents to incur an almost 61% tax bill.

[dietpizzauk]

VAT is charged for any items (expect gifts worth £39 or less) sent from outside the UK, to the UK. As per the HMRC website.

I’m on the same boat as you, where ParcelForce have sent me a bill for VAT and fee. It was also during the BOGO offer they had, so I’m guessing it’s to do with the declared value of the items vs what we actually paid. I’m guessing they’ve declared the full value of both items, rather than the price we paid. We paid the VAT value based on our total, HMRC are wanting the VAT value on the value declared.

I don’t think this was intentional by Mattel Creations. I sent them an email regarding this issue, and they’ve stated they’ll reimburse for the extra charges. Have you tried getting in touch with them?

[Path 2 Glory]

well that sucks, should probably contact them though.

[Deleted]

We aren’t Mattel Creations Customer Service. Nor is anyone affiliated with this forum.

You should contact their Customer Service.

[AxelSmackdown]

Dec 22, 2023 10:51:26 GMT -5 @twistedone22388 said:

We aren’t Mattel Creations Customer Service. Nor is anyone affiliated with this forum.

You should contact their Customer Service.

He’s telling people his experience and advising them to stay away from doing business with them. It’s ok.

[jumpinjefffarmer]

Same boat. Have a customs bill to pay. What a crappy thing to do to loyal customers at christmas.

[AttitudeLegendCollector]

Clearly this isn’t intentional but it’s sloppy and hopefully customer service will fix it by reimbursing the difference.

[TheXtremisT]

Dec 22, 2023 10:51:26 GMT -5 @twistedone22388 said:

We aren’t Mattel Creations Customer Service. Nor is anyone affiliated with this forum.

You should contact their Customer Service.

Maybe actually try reading sometime? There's been a number of your spiky responses to people in this manner and each time it was "grumpy old man makes mistaken assumption and posts irrelevant reply to OP/comment".

[TheXtremisT]

Could you imagine what would have happened if the Nitro stage got funded and shipped next year, and everyone ordering outside of the US and especially in the UK, probably getting hit with a customs charge of about £300?

There would be an uproar.

[Biff Slamkovich™]

As a Canadian collector it's a bit different for us. When we order things from the US we're typically on the hook for duties, taxes and sometimes fees in order to get things across the border. Sometimes companies calculate and charge for those up front (like when I order from Amazon US) or sometimes those charges are not communicated and collected up front and must be paid prior to delivery of your package (like when I order from Ringside).

If you're being charged for VAT and the value of your package was under the threshold you should contact either the courier or MC directly to inquire cause that's not fair at all. If the package didn't meet the threshold and was eligible to be hit with VAT, then there's probably nothing you'll be able to do unfortunately.

[markanthonyxiii]

I've been stung by customs as well.

Despite me trying to tell them the charges were inclusive of the item, I won't be getting these before X-Mas as HMRC are closed till after the holidays which is annoying.

I've E-Mailed Mattel complaining so will see what they say as they can't tell us Charges are included then set us up to pay even more charges. Doesn't feel like we've had BOGOF as we've paid the price it would be normally.

Sneakily done if intended.

[Apocalypse]

Ebay was doing this for a while too. They would charge customs fees when not applicable and ut drove me nuts.


So as i know, when i ship things out of canada, if i ship to the states and its over $100 then my customer pays about 20% in customs fees. And vice vera from usa to canada. Usually about 20% after $100

Ow if i ship to the uk. It seems if i ship over $20 that theres a percentage for customs added. The customs fee to the u.k is really unfair. Not sure if that helped at all but better than triple S's tonedeaf and rude comment

[cuppacoffeeyeaaah]

This has put me off ordering the Piper Steele 2 pack I can’t be bothered with the hassle of getting charged customs then having to contact Mattel for reimbursement. Mattel say customs is included and £9 delivery that should be it.

[dpd1967]

Er I have to laugh 😂 or cry 😭 I just went on the Mattel creations website and the first thing I saw was we ship to the Uk 🇬🇧 . Er I don’t think so.

[PJ]

I don’t know what to say about the customs. But I will say just because you bought something from them as a BOGO sale the value they have to declare it at is still has to be the full price as if there was no BOGO. Because that is still the true value of the items should the package get lost or damaged and a claim is filed.

[Deleted]

Dec 22, 2023 11:50:38 GMT -5 AxelSmackdown said:

Dec 22, 2023 10:51:26 GMT -5 @twistedone22388 said:

We aren’t Mattel Creations Customer Service. Nor is anyone affiliated with this forum.

You should contact their Customer Service.

He’s telling people his experience and advising them to stay away from doing business with them. It’s ok.

Which I fully agree with, but this could very well either be explained or fixed (if it was a mistake) by their Customer Support team. Rather than tossing on the tinfoil hat and claiming they’ve been lied to and accusing MC of doing shady business.

There’s a reason for everything. There’s two sides to every story. If it’s all lies and shady business practices, THEN you run their name through the mud. At least reach out to them first and give them a chance to explain/fix the situation.

[nomorexclusives]

An easy solution to this is for mattel to build a warehouse in the uk so things can be shipped domestically. For europe i believe it is screwed as the amount of toy collectors and wrestling fans is far and few between. crappy situation. Shipping rules changed in march of this year and anything sent overseas to europe requires an increased amount of detail on the customs forms and scrutiny when it is received by customs personnel. Any brand new items especially. I sent a declared gift to a friend in europe ( about 110 euros in value) and she had to pay nearly 25%. Not sure on the UK but ever since they left the EU everything shipped out of the uk is very expensive now. For me shipping to the eu or uk is finished. I will only ship to canada now. I am pretty sure soon mattel creations will opt out and do the same. The rules and fees are just too much.

This is all done on purpose to reduce carbon. The less people ship the less boats and planes travel overseas and even domestically. Expect things to get worse and not better. I would not be surprised if it goes up to 35% at some point.

[Warriah']

Dec 23, 2023 13:36:08 GMT -5 PJ said:

I don’t know what to say about the customs. But I will say just because you bought something from them as a BOGO sale the value they have to declare it at is still has to be the full price as if there was no BOGO. Because that is still the true value of the items should the package get lost or damaged and a claim is filed.

Literally not true.

The value on a customs form is declared as the price paid by the customer.

Why would the manufacturer file a claim (incase of loss or damage) greater than the goods were sold for? That’s ridiculously illegal lol.