Buying from India.

[Rick C]

Just looking at e-bay and see what looks like many bargains from India, does anyone order from there and do you get clobbered with import duty when the parts arrive. Any other problems ? Thanks.

 

[Wintrup]

The bloke I bought the bike from gets a lot of stuff from India. He showed me the array of helmets and other gear he'd bought for a pittance. But then, being an RE nut, he had a contact in India, so got Indian prices with maybe a small mark up. Didn't say owt about import duty. We could use a man in India for groups buys. (Sam!)

 

[BurnieM]

In Australia ebay bills us 10% GST (like VAT) and passes it on to the Australian Government.
Apart from that no other fees here.

 

[sam2019]

We could use a man in India for groups buys. (Sam!)

sorry, I'd have to decline the honor. India is not like Germany where u order something and it gets to you the next day. Here it is a drawn out process that involves a lot of running around and waiting and then getting the wrong part, not to mention payment barriers because as tourist you cant use PayTM or not even the Indian version of google pay. Few Indians accept Paypal and if they do PP imposes 4% on every transaction, the friends option is unavailable with PP in India so 4% it is.
I am doing this for my associate in Italy from whom I get the pistons, it is part of our agreement. But its a major pain ever time I have to do it.

To give you a typical example: when you order you get told 10 days, then after 2 weeks its another week, then another, finally you find out the stuff has been sitting for 4 days in the couriers base but the driver was too drunk/lazy/otherwise engaged to deliver.
Once you receive the goods you pack everything up nicely and hand it over to the courier service or postal service only to get it back the next day because the guy at the counter had miscalculated the fee and you have to pay 50% more for this reason or another. These are not horror stories, this is day to day life if you ship stuff from India.

And this assumes that a central point of reception, payment and distribution exists in the "west" or else I would have to send stuff out to may different addresses and deal with numerous payments. You can see how this is exceedingly unattractive

Some may know that I do my own stuff here as you can see from my shop page. If someone orders from there and asks me to add this or that to the shipment I will do that, particularly if its stuff I personally keep in stock like brake pads and air filters and such. But in these cases its my business and I have to ship anyway so it is not really adding much to my work load.

Shop – Home of the 477 Big Bore

himalayan-tools.com

 

[sam2019]

However, I did ship a complete bike to a friend 10 years ago. That was 600 US$ at the time and well worth it for him. But times have changed and it may not even be possible anymore to register such a bike, at least I know its not in the EU.
A Himalayan new (BS6) costs 2500 US$ here in India. add say 1000 for shipping and then taxes etc. and you get almost the same price you would have to pay in the USA.
It may be worth the while for a complete overhauled engine, but thats a long time into the future for most unless you want it upgraded here to 462cc (say to save the money for the mechanic to do it locally) and keep your original as a working backup. My guess would be that such an engine would cost less than a new one without the upgrade.

 

[Jerk]

I’ve bought quite a bit of stuff from an eBay seller named RoyalEnfieldking. It always arrives at my doorstep here in the USA in three days via DHL.

 

[Mgouge]

I've bought several Royal Enfield OEM accessories from different eBay vendors in India offering free shipping. Arrives in North Carolina in 3 days via FedEx. That's faster than I can get something from Tennesse or Georgia!

 

[sam2019]

I read this with some measure of amazement. me wonders how these guys get their hands on the parts they ship in the first place. If its standard replacement like brake pads, filters etc. that obviously is from own stock but what about a little more excotic stuff like a camshaft or a cylinder? The shipping time from the factory to those suppliers may be short if the are located near the factory. But even Delhi/Rishikesh can take 10 days and thats only 250km.

 

[Rick C]

Mixed answers so I will have to order something and see what happens ? Thanks.

 

[sam2019]

Upon investigating it seems that DHL really offers 3-day delivery service from India to the US. I have so far used the postal service which needs much longer, up to 2 weeks. Mostly because I am lazy and the next DHL station is 90 minutes ride from where I live. But I will test their pickup service next time I have to ship to Europe or the US.