Thread: Shipping from the US through a mate.

Originally Posted by zimmer

Agree with Kscott's comments. You had best cruise into the Customs website and study the bit about gifts and personal effects and the duties they can attract if they meet the criteria. It is all well covered in their document. All items need to be assigned a value and Customs are well onto artificially low values/bogus warranty repairs labels and so forth.
I now await all the postings about how mates/brothers/cousins have sent stuff from the States successfully to the mates/relatives in NZ without Customs catching on. You may occasionally fluke it but that is probably luck only same as not getting caught for gst sometimes. And the recommendations on forums that you have a mate break the law in USA on your behalf are laughable.

Completely legal to send optics from the US. not asking him to send ar mags or anything. The reason I ask is I often see people send talk about sedning stuff through a mate to get around the customs limit. I wont be sending a 2k scope but it will be over the appreciable limit. I had a good read through the customs website which is about as clear as mud regarding what you will have to pay and which levvies are applicable