Has my item been held at customs? I'm confused.

nena1234 · Post by **nena1234** » 17 Jan 2018, 21:17

Hello,

I have some legal documents coming from a my hopefully soon to be ex husband, and he provided me with tracking details and after it departed San Francisco Airport it updated to "Your item departed a transfer airport in HEATHROW, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" at 10:30am this morning, and throughout the day nothing else has changed. I tried doing a quick search and saw several posts mention it could be held in customs, and that USPS scan items as they get off the plane - hence the update of "Your item departed a transfer airport in HEATHROW, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" - parcelforce still says departed San Francisco and nothing about "Your item departed a transfer airport in HEATHROW, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" - but I saw people saying it won't get scanned until it's released at customs and the item was sent Priority Mail Express International™ scheduled delivery by Friday 8pm - I am not sure if I should be concerned, or how to interpret this - I imagined that all packages being imported would go through this process and it was just part of the deal before it would be released and sent onto parcelforce to complete the delivery - or does it only change to "Your item departed a transfer airport in HEATHROW, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" when something is amiss and they're inspecting it for some reason like tax purposes etc. I spoke to my ex and he said he had to fill in a customs deceleration at the post office declared what the item was, and it's value - which he put as $0 as they're legal documents and hold no material value - which to me seems dumb... probably why im divorcing him, and signed it. Basically, what does it actually mean when it says "Your item departed a transfer airport in HEATHROW, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" is it something to be concerned about or entirely standard and just have to give them time to process the item through Heathrow until it can be released to Parcelforce? I'm more concerned that because it's just legal documents that if they cut into the packaging to inspect the item for tax purposes they'll damage the documents and since he put $0 as the value because they were legal documents what does that mean? Will they be opened up inspected, and returned or?

Post by **TrueBlueTerrier** » 18 Jan 2018, 05:08

That's a USPS scan for some reason they scan if before they pass it to Customs. Keep tracking it as it still has time for delivery by tomorrow.

The value is usually the commercial value for customs purposes so $0 would be correct in most cases.

nena1234 · Post by **nena1234** » 18 Jan 2018, 05:48

So I should not be concerned about him placing the value at $0 as he declared the item as documents, just that the items went from "January 16, 2018, 6:29 pm
Departed Los Angeles, UNITED STATES " to "January 17, 2018, 10:23 am Departed LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM" - and so far at 05:47am here there have been no updates on the 18th - it's due to be delivered tomorrow by the 19th at 8:00pm. Do you think this delivery won't take place?

Post by **Snaggletooth** » 18 Jan 2018, 07:15

The question for customs declarations is "how much have you sold this for" or "how much did it cost you to buy this?" If the answer is "you can't buy it in the shops / on a website" then the declaration should be zero. Legal fees for the creation of the documents do not count as they are not taxable at customs. The details you describe are very common and there should not be a problem if that is all there is in the packet (hopefully there isn't a passport in there).

Your package is still likely to be delivered on time.

nena1234 · Post by **nena1234** » 18 Jan 2018, 08:01

Thanks, I still received no further updates at 24hrs later on the tracking system. No, no passport just some divorce documents lol. Do they not just open up everyone's incoming mail and inspect the items or do they just typically read the deceleration and tax as appropriate according to the deceleration it's self. It also appears on parcelforce that it's not even arrived in the UK?

nena1234 · Post by **nena1234** » 18 Jan 2018, 13:38

Still no updates on the tracking since the 17th, and it's now 13:37 and the last update was on January 17, 2018, 10:23 am. Am I being too optimistic to think it can still be progressed between now and tomorrow, and still arrive for its schedule delivery date Friday 19th by 8pm? It still seems to be in customs as nothing has been updated since - "January 17, 2018, 10:23 am Departed LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM"

Post by **TrueBlueTerrier** » 18 Jan 2018, 14:09

It can still make it. A lot of stuff moves through the RM/PF network overnight for delivery next day.

nena1234 · Post by **nena1234** » 18 Jan 2018, 17:28

I hope so, as of now it's still not made any updates and it's 17:27. I'm hoping it moves over night, as I actually planned a divorce party tomorrow and it would seem silly if I had not actually received any of the legal papers on time. Would you say there is a cut off time either tonight/tomorrow where I can be pretty sure it's not coming tomnorrow.