Us customs Seizing stuff....

[M1K3]

for starters i ordered this p90x workout program from a china seller on ioffer.com (similar to ebay..just haggling involved) which im sure many people have heard of. i received it and was legit with no problems and everything was great! Now i have quite a few overweight friends and talked about this to a lot of ppl. I managed to get 10 ppl to want there own as well. I bought them from the same seller at wholesale for 400 USD.(a good deal) as they were delivered they were in 1 box and once they got to US customs they sat for round 4-5 days...way to long. and i received a letter saying my items were seized for illegal importation. Needless to say i wasnt very happy. now i am not buying and selling these. they were paid for by each individual and for there sole use. they are not priated, or an illegal video thats not allowed in the U.S. I honestly have no idea how to go about this. From what ive gathered getting refunds through paypal from a china seller is not easy. and getting my items to me is not easy either. Now i am pretty positive since they are not fakes, and even if they were, that i can not be prosecuted, seeing as they were never actually my goods. I am eager for any advice on this situation...all i get from google is people who have imported pirated dvd's to resell. neither of which apply here. Thanks for any advice.

[CBRich]

The innocent must suffer to protect the owners of the copyrights. Remember the whole innocent until proven guilty thing? Not anymore. Now if a copyright holder even thinks you may have done something against them you are guilty. And in this case your property is seized. Just thinking about it pisses me off.

[SmoothZ]

I used to work for Customs so I can help you out by explaining it.

First of all, you are importing on behalf of several other people. This almost classifies you as a business, but I know you're not. Not a big deal really since people do this type of activity all the time for legitimate reasons. You probably had the supplier use China Express Mail services, which is the cheapest way to ship from there. If you use UPS or Fedex or DHL, those companies are licensed brokers that can enter goods on your behalf. Unscrupulous Chinese suppliers avoid those big names because they know it's harder to pass Customs.

Secondly, I can guarantee you that almost everything from China is counterfeit or cheaply made. If Customs found your package to contain articles that have a copyright or trademark protection in the form of an official registration, then they checked the database and found out more than likely that the P90X packet probably is not authorized from China. They probably called legal counsel and was told that it was not legit.

If they seize it, then technically you're going to be liable for it. The seizure of the shipment is going to generate an automatic letter sent to your shipping address, which I'm assuming you got. The form probably outlines the statutes and allows you to either petition for a mitigated penalty or not at all.

Buying from China via ebay or paypal or whatever is no guarantee for making the purchase legit. Ultimately, you as the consumer have no idea of the source of that product. Now if you go to a legit store here in the US, chances are really good that the product you're buying is legally marked, imported, manufactured, etc. That's why you pay the prices you pay here.

Customs is charged with protecting the American public from unsafe products AND to protect the American economy from being flooded with cheap knockoffs from such places as China or India.

I would not worry about you getting prosecuted for 10 dvds. The govt has much more important things to worry about. Trust me on that one.

[M1K3]

Originally Posted by SmoothZ

I used to work for Customs so I can help you out by explaining it.

First of all, you are importing on behalf of several other people. This almost classifies you as a business, but I know you're not. Not a big deal really since people do this type of activity all the time for legitimate reasons. You probably had the supplier use China Express Mail services, which is the cheapest way to ship from there. If you use UPS or Fedex or DHL, those companies are licensed brokers that can enter goods on your behalf. Unscrupulous Chinese suppliers avoid those big names because they know it's harder to pass Customs.

Secondly, I can guarantee you that almost everything from China is counterfeit or cheaply made. If Customs found your package to contain articles that have a copyright or trademark protection in the form of an official registration, then they checked the database and found out more than likely that the P90X packet probably is not authorized from China. They probably called legal counsel and was told that it was not legit.

If they seize it, then technically you're going to be liable for it. The seizure of the shipment is going to generate an automatic letter sent to your shipping address, which I'm assuming you got. The form probably outlines the statutes and allows you to either petition for a mitigated penalty or not at all.

Buying from China via ebay or paypal or whatever is no guarantee for making the purchase legit. Ultimately, you as the consumer have no idea of the source of that product. Now if you go to a legit store here in the US, chances are really good that the product you're buying is legally marked, imported, manufactured, etc. That's why you pay the prices you pay here.

Customs is charged with protecting the American public from unsafe products AND to protect the American economy from being flooded with cheap knockoffs from such places as China or India.

I would not worry about you getting prosecuted for 10 dvds. The govt has much more important things to worry about. Trust me on that one.

Thanks a lot for the info. Yea ive def learned from buying things out of the country at all is just not worth it. Kind of a pain cause i just didnt think of this happeing. Thought it would be a simple shipping process. Well lived and learned, not to do it again. thanks again!

[PapoZalsa]

Good info since a lot of seller in eBay are from China and use the PayPal system which is a pain in the a$$ to deal with them if something happens.