Last week I got two emails from "Russian businessmen". They are complaining about the difficulty of doing business, due to the high taxes there.
So, they suggest a "workaround": they need to find people to PRIVATELY ship merchandise to them. This will skirt the taxes/tariffs/import duties.
Sounds good, we can all make money, right??? Well there are multiple hitches here.
1) If they are like the Nigeria scammers, you will set up a bank account and give them account numbers and money will magically disappear!!! Nigeria seems to have made an industry of this technique. This has been discussed here before and there are even web sites on this.
2) They could be "legitimate". OK, so a real businessman wants to hook up with you. Maybe it's not a "fast buck" rip-off. This is not impossible, as I have dealt with Russians on trading matters.
So I checked with one of my FREIGHT FORWARDER friends. She said this is known as "double-dipping and is very illegal. The fines are quite heavy.
In other words, if you are doing Import/Export, EXPECT to encounter Customs, EXPECT to fill out LOTS OF PAPERWORK, EXPECT to pay fees. Add all this into the normal "cost of doing business"; you may find that you have to pay more out than comes back in!!!
This is why the "PRO's" are there. They have the paperwork and fees figured out, their margin is good, they have the "contacts" on both ends and they "know the ropes". If you aren't already in the business, you are going to get burned!!!
So, be warned, here it comes!!!
BTW, the US State Department is usually interested in all these things. Whether it is paper mail or email, the SD will look at it and perhaps investigate.
They at least file it to refer to against future events.
The Freight Forwarder said that the SD regularly requests her to send all such correspondence to them.
Also, I would expect this one to sweep KH's around the country
Mustang