Importing a NEW car from Eastern Europe

[Audois]

Desperately need some very quick help on this one!

I have a client who wishes to import a NEW car from Eastern Europe (a new EU member).

Would the car be taxed on arrival in France when being re-registered?  Or would you just follow the same formalities as bringing any car into France from an EU country?

As far as I am aware NEW EU imports are not subject to any 'tax' penalty!

Can someone confirm this please!

 

 

[Audois]

PS.  I cannot find a Renault 'Logan' in existance in France .... do they exist?

http://www.renault.com/presse/detail.cfm?langue=2&id=7571

I can't get into the PDF documents to see if they were released in France or not ...

 

 

[Will]

It's made in the Dacia factory in Romania, and is based on existing Renault parts, to a very basic specification, purely for sale in poorer countries (particularly Czech republic, Morocco and Romania) which are seen as offering good growth potential as long as cars can be sold cheaply enough.

Dacia used to produce old-model Renaults with very dubious build quality, rather like Lada and FSO used to do with Fiats. I knew somebody who was stupid enough to buy a Dacia in Britain.

The Logan, or X90, is a basically new design, using parts from Clio, Twingo and Espace, as well as some Nissan parts (Renault has an alliance with Nissan), intended to be put together by hand in cheap factories with minimal automation levels where labour costs are low. Any new-design parts are produced in third-world countries, everything is put together as a kit in Romania so that it can be assembled elsewhere. It is not intended to sell the vehicle in the major European countries, it has been designed specifically for the Central and Eastern European markets, plus Morocco, while it is intended to go on sale in Iran and Columbia in the near future. It offers a Lada-like philosophy, where cheapness, size-for-money, and ability to be driven in poor conditions and maintained by unskilled personnel are more important than refinement or new technology. The third-world taxi market is seen as particularly significant for the Logan.

Information distilled mainly from a very long press release.

Further to the above, even if tax has been paid in the Eastern European country of origin, there should probably be additional tax payable. However, getting the required type approval certificate could prove to be the major headache.

[PaysBasque]

Look at this thread

http://forums.livingfrance.com/shwmessage.aspx?ForumID=293&MessageID=165310

where the tax situation etc. is explained for a car bought in Germany, but applies to all cars bought outside of France which are under 6mths old and have less than 6000km on the clock.

[Audois]

Will, you're basically saying that a Dacia, although a 'French' built car (or at least by a French owned company) won't necessarily be issued a 'CdeC' by the authorities ... due to it's 'third world' roadworthiness?!!!  Thanks for the information, I'm getting worried as it's probably me who'll drive it back here!!!!!!!!

Christiane, thank you for the link .. however this would come directly into France ... so would the fact that the owner (who might - I'm not sure) be VAT registered through their company and a full time UK resident get away with this arrangement?

If the car was bought and full taxes paid at time of purchase, would the owner still be needing to fork out for French TVA on arrival (or impots generally?) to get it registered?

Any advice appreciated!

[Mpprh]

Hi

The rule in the EU is that you can buy a new car in any of the full member states tax free and pay the tax in the country of registration based on the cost in the country of purchase. You have about 1 month to complete the registration. It may be worthwhile if the country you are buying from has lower prices, or the exchange rate is poor.

The problem may well be that the newly joined states are in a transition period and have exemptions from European certificates of conformity and/or the tax free arrangements until some time in the future.

Peter

 

 

 

 

[Audois]

I've made a BIG MISTAKE ....

The country is NOT YET an EU MEMBER STATE!!!

 

Now where does this leave me in terms of taxes for France on entering/registering???????

 

Any help?  Thanks

[Pierre ZFP]

There is already a thread on this subject, cars from inside and ooutside the EU.

Probably all the info you need is available thanks to Penny29.

Try this link, I thought it was brilliant!

http://riviera.angloinfo.com/information/1/motoregister.asp

Pierre from a sunny but cool Luxembourg

 

[Audois]

Thanks for that most of it I've done before ... but where I'm stuck is how do the impots calculate the tax/duty due on the vehicle ... that's the figure I need - or at least an idea of!!!!

[Pierre ZFP]

Many, Many years ago I used to work for HM C&E at Folkestone harbour. We had many imported cars both new and used.  Doing the valuation and paperwork for these was a pain as you were under a lot of pressure to do it quickly and got it in the neck if you made a mistake.  Anyway, my recollection (and this is many years ago) for cars from outside the EU is as follows: 

For Used Cars, the value is the part exchange price taken from Glasses Guide plus any extras less any damage, high milage etc. 

For new cars it is similar but the value is the whosale price of the car in the country of importation.  I guess you would have to get this from Renault but if they don't import to France it might be a bit tricky

You take this value and apply duty (10.4% or was) Then add the duty to the value and apply VAT to the whole lot (17.5 % in UK, don't know French rate for cars).  So much for the Principle of double taxes!

The invoice price means very little because of all the obvious scams so don't bother trying to get the garage to give you a lower invoice 'for Customs' .

I may have some of the above a little wrong, it was very long ago but if you worked on paying 25 to 30% of the purchase price in tax you won't be far wrong

Hope this helps a little

[Audois]

Thanks for that Pierre.

I was working on a 19.6% customs rate (as a guess) and it seems that the car will cost more to bring in now than it's 'launch' price in June when it's released in France at 7,500 for the basic model. 

The client can buy it for 6,000euros so adding in all the 'hassle' factor, customs and re-reg, it's going to be rather expensive!  The current idea is to use it for 6months or 6,000km then import it!