Tuesday 17 July 2012

A double edged sword.

I was pleased to get a little grey card through the letterbox yesterday. It said that I had a parcel to pick up from the Royal Mail depot.

Yay! My Comms robots for my Tunnel Fighter Clanker units had arrived from Canada (I have opened the middle one):


Click the Pic!

Now, I knew I was going to have to pay VAT (£5-19) on the parcel but what surprised me was the £8-00 'handling charge' that the Royal Mail charged... making my order cost stack up to WAY more than the miniatures are worth.

This is a real shame because the miniatures are very nice.

I noticed another thing when I picked the parcel up... it rattled a lot. When I opened it, there was a nice lot of polystyrene in the box but there was no foam in the blisters so all the bits and bobs were rattling together like runes in a bag. I must admit to feeling a little bit disappointed about it but I guess that is the way some companies play it.

In other news... I have bent the next armature into shape. It is a coat hanger so it was tough going but I have to get my other commission out of the way so starting it is a good thing to do. It will be a very skinny cyclist, wearing Lycra and a cycle helmet. I expect to put the first blobs of putty on the frame tonight but I am too tired to do much more. Still... I have the house to myself at the moment so I can enjoy the peace before the noise arrives.

See you from the devil's shadow!

4 comments:

Simon Quinton said...

Ouchie could you not of got them through leisure games?

Inso said...

I probably would have if I'd known they sold RAFM miniatures...

...another site to check before I buy anything :)

Cheers for the heads up :)

Red_Cardinal said...

The Royal Mail charge a standard charge of £8.00 because they have to pay your Vat charge (and any import duty charge) upfront.

What bugs me about Vat is that it's usually charged on the purchase price PLUS the postage...

Inso said...

Thanks Red, I didn't know that. It is still a lot of money but at least they are doing SOMETHING for it. It just seemed to be a case of them charging money to hold on to your parcel and take your money to hand over to HMC&E.