Dutch bike part dealer shipping to every country in the world except UK because of Brexit VAT change

I have been buying from Dutch bike company Mantel for a few years now. They have things that UK sellers don't sell or are much cheaper.
Over Christmas they stopped shipping to the UK due to ' heavy traffic at our carriers'
I have looked at their customer service page where they explain how the free shipping on orders over £35 was free will be changing.

Are the shipping costs going up?
Yes, the new shipping costs will be £ 9.99 for all orders.

When are the shipping costs going up?
The implementation date of the new rates will be on Monday Januari 18. We have chosen this date as for the period from 24 December 2020 up until 4 Januari our carrier was unable to provide shipping labels due to the shipping stop caused by the corona virus. As a consequence we have extended the use of the old rates for a period of 14 days. This way you can still place your order for the old shipping rate of £6,49 for orders under £35 and free for orders over that amount if you failed to do so before 31 December.

Why are the shipping costs going up?
UPS must import all parcels one by one into the UK. This means that they all have to be declared at customs and our carrier will charge extra for this.

But why are we all buying from Europe?
For me, Ribble has gone. Wiggle and Chain Reaction seem to have lost their top spots since they joined forces. Same products, same prices, most items out of stock and prices are no longer competitive. Merlin are still a good retailer and I use them regularly.

Bloody hell, now even bike24 are showing as not shipping to U.K.! It gets better and better. Keep winning!

Brexit happened, cake and eating it etc etc.

BUT

Imho what the UK Gov is doing here is the ONLY way to do things and ensure that VAT will be collected at all.  They have the right idea, it's the EU who should emulate this for all third-country sales that are entering.  The seller or his platform register for VAT purposes, collect VAT and transfer it to the MS where the buyer lives.  Their registering the transaction generates a code which is printed on the label and can be checked.  No valid code:  seizure of the package.

In all other scenarios, the treasury gets robbed blind and domestic sellers face an insurmountable disadvantage because the goods will simply be sold without VAT, through a seller who goes 'missing trader' after a couple of months, undervalued so as to abuse all kinds of low value consignment relief rules (Chinese speciality) etc.

So although I'm glad to be finally shot of the UK and continue to believe that with leaders like Boris you're in for a rough ride, someone had a moment of clarity there.

When buying online within the EU the retailer automatically applies the VAT of the country of delivery rather than the VAT of the retailer's country. It has been so for a few years already, at least with the larger retailers. Therefore tax collection in one country on behalf of another already happens within the UE. My understanding is that retailers report to their respective tax authorities and VAT clearance is then settled in aggregate between nations (rather than each retailer answering sale-by-sale to twenty-six foreign tax authorities, which would be bonkers).

Ha!

https://singletrackworld.com/2021/01/brooks-temporarily-suspends-shipmen...

If one supplier exits the market, another may see the opportunity to fill that gap. The one thing that is sure as shite is that any additional costs will eventually be picked up by the customer.

I've been buying online long enough to remember the days of the single market without close alignment of VAT rates between the member countries. It always created distortions - for example, at the turn of the century Holland had preferential taxation on new cars and so there are a ton of Dutch imports around from that era. And from memory it was cheaper for a while to buy electronics from Germany rather than in the UK. There were also companies exploiting taxation rules for the Channel Islands and Isle of Man - remember Play247? That's still going on - recently bought some dirt cheap SD cards from a company in the IoM. Point is, retailers will find a way to game the taxation system to offer lower prices on commodity goods, because online trade is largely frictionless (price first, then returns policy, then convenience is what governs where you buy).

We returned to Paris yesterday. We all have EU passports except my daughter who still travels on her UK passport. (She is an EU citizen but we haven't got around to getting her passport) Anyway we all sailed through French border checks at St Pancras except my daughter who was stopped and asked to explain why she was going to France and for how long. We had to produce evidence (which we had prepared for) as to her reason to travel to France. Her passport was then stamped with a warning that if she outstays her permitted stay she will be 'illegal'. (She is 10 years old) On the train, as we approached Paris, the carriages started to fill with on-board Customs Police. Everyone was asked what they were carrying etc and some people had their baggage checked. It was great. It was like being back in the 1970s. Can't wait to return to London and get the full UK Border Force treatment - probably get called a 'w+g' or 'paddy' or similar just to add to the authenticiticy. 

Over the summer the only places with good parts stock were the DE retailers (Bikester, BikeDiscount, etc.) If that continues, expect higher prices here and longer delivery times - time to stock up on cassettes and chains perhaps.

It is all project fear I tell you - yeah right sure it.  This is just the tip of the rather large iceberg we are just about to crash into.

we (some of us!) voted for it so we have only ourselves to blame.

This is the same rule that Switzerland implemented in 2018. The only downside was that Amazon.com stopped shipping to Switzerland but we can still order from the .de and .co.uk sites. The huge benefit is that Swiss VAT is already paid at pirchade so the post and courier companies can't charge you the crazily expensive import admin fee to add do the import and you get no nasty surprises. TBH, it's the best thing to happen with respect to buying mail order from the EU to Switzerland.

Article neglects to mention the Netherlands has near identical rules:

"Supplying to private individuals or foreign entrepreneurs
Do you supply goods to private individuals or other foreign entrepreneurs in the Netherlands? Then you must charge VAT. You are also required to file a VAT return in the Netherlands. In order to do so, you must register yourself with the Netherlands Tax and Customs Administration."

Now the complainant could be excused for not knowing this as they are within the Netherlands, however I'm sure they sell to Germany which also has similar rules, so the concept shouldn't be new to them.

If you need dutch bike spares or indeed a new bike, hollandbikeshop.com & bikester.co.uk (Germany) is operating normally.