General diyAudio store feedback thread

Hi,

Something weird is going on with the store.

I checked the availability and price of the BA2022 essential kit and saw it was available and cost $20.
diyaudiostore brave.jpg


I wanted to check shipping costs (I will probably wait to order when I need a few other things) but noticed my password for the store was stored in my other browser, so changed browser and logged into the store.

Logging in has changed the price from $20 to $33 :mad:
diyaudiostore logged in.jpg

I assume this is because the store provider (shopify?) is automatically converting US$ to AU$ and charging 5% for this convenience (exchange rate is 1.575295 rather than 1.65).

I don't mind if the diyaudiostore makes a bit of extra money on foreign exchange, but don't think the store will receive the money. I think it is the shop/payment provider (shopify) who is making the extra profit for a "convenience" I cannot switch off.

Is there a way to order and pay in US$?
 
I bought an ACA mini essentials kit for $25, and it turns out I have to pay $28 more in customs import fees (I'm in Europe). This never happens when I buy from Mouser, where prices and fees are totally transparent. Of course, this makes future buying from your shop impractical due to the hidden costs.
 
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I stopped buying from the DIYaudio store sometime ago because of duties and taxes both ends (it more than double the cost of an item by the time it lands here in the UK) sadly its just to expensive. :mad: Im not blaming the DIYaudio store, thats the way it is now.
 
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I've been a DK and Mouser customer for years. As I live in Canada, Mouser's prices have included "Incoterms", that is they include your country's state and/or local and import taxes. That's why they don't show them, so you don't see any of those import fees. I also do not get charged any extra by the courier.
In the case of DIYA store, when I purchased recently I paid the same taxes and fees of the courier that you do (except for those country differences) Once the folks at the store ship it out, it's really out of their hands! In every sense! ;)
 
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We invested a lot of time and money into offering DDP (delivered duties paid) services over the last few years, and stopped offering DDP about 6 months ago as the reality for a micro-business like ours is that the costs of managing DDP were untenably high, which would have flowed into the prices of the products in the store. Very large companies have teams of boffins working on solving this problem for you, which we don't have. And even companies like Zonos who could have provided us a 3rd party solution to handling DDP have to pad their margins heavily - the end result is you would have paid more. If a company does offer you DDP services then you are paying more than if they did not.

We've undertaken a number of business simplifications over the last 2 years, including stopping with dropshipping, in order to remove operations frictions. You will start to see the benefits of those changes soon in the form of more, and more frequent product offerings.

Trying to crack the DDP nut again is still on the cards, but not for a few years and only when the store has grown substantially.

Vincent - you might like to try arrange with other DIYers to order a bunch into your country or the EU and then distribute from within the EU. The bulk of the $28 you describe was almost certainly a "per shipment" customs fee you were charged, not a "per item" fee. The best way to reduce that fee in the future is with your vote in the next election, but I don't see the EU removing their customs fees or VAT.
 
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I bought an ACA mini essentials kit for $25, and it turns out I have to pay $28 more in customs import fees (I'm in Europe).
That's something you can take up with your government. I'm pretty sure DIYaudio Store has no influence on your import tax rates. ;)

This never happens when I buy from Mouser, where prices and fees are totally transparent.
They're actually not "totally transparent". You're right that the final price that you see on Mouser is what you end up paying in the end, including import fees, taxes, whatnot. What they are not transparent about is that they add 10-15% to their prices when you use the DDP (delivery duties paid) option. You can test this pretty easily by looking up a product on Mouser with your local currency and DDP selected. Then convert the cost to USD and change Mouser's settings to USD with incoterms: FCA. Do the math.

I just ordered about $2k worth of components for my next board build. I saved about $200-300 by selecting USD, incoterms FCA rather than my country default of CAD, DDP.

We invested a lot of time and money into offering DDP (delivered duties paid) services over the last few years, and stopped offering DDP about 6 months ago as the reality for a micro-business like ours is that the costs of managing DDP were untenably high
Yeah. It's a non-starter for a small business.

Tom
 
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The bulk of the $28 you describe was almost certainly a "per shipment" customs fee you were charged, not a "per item" fee. The best way to reduce that fee in the future is with your vote in the next election, but I don't see the EU removing their customs fees or VAT.
Actually, of the $28, $8 are the taxes (normal and expected), and $20 are "processing fees" that the private transport company is extorting.
The next elections won't change anything. Although the US is EU's largest trading partner, there are no plans for a free trade agreement, the negotiations were formally closed in 2019.
 
That's something you can take up with your government. I'm pretty sure DIYaudio Store has no influence on your import tax rates. ;)
It's normal to pay import taxes and VAT, but, without DDP services, the fees demanded by the transporter are excessive, as detailed above. It makes such imports unviable.

They're actually not "totally transparent". You're right that the final price that you see on Mouser is what you end up paying in the end, including import fees, taxes, whatnot. What they are not transparent about is that they add 10-15% to their prices when you use the DDP (delivery duties paid) option. You can test this pretty easily by looking up a product on Mouser with your local currency and DDP selected. Then convert the cost to USD and change Mouser's settings to USD with incoterms: FCA. Do the math.

I'm happy with how Mouser works: on checkout, they add 21% tax, and shipping is included. When I click the "Buy" button, I know exactly how much it's going to cost. No unpleasant surprises here.
 
It's normal to pay import taxes and VAT, but, without DDP services, the fees demanded by the transporter are excessive
I have noticed that the processing/brokerage fees imposed in the EU can be pretty punitive. Is there a way around that that doesn't involve DDP?

For example, if I receive a package by "orange" FedEx (so their 'air' services - not FedEx Ground) they normally charge a $10 brokerage fee to take the package across the border. But they'll do it for free for anyone with a FedEx account, which is free and easy to set up. So basically I get free brokerage with FedEx and use them a lot for that reason. Then I only pay the sales tax on import.

Is there something similar with FedEx or UPS in the EU?

I'm asking because this is an obvious sticking point for many of my customers in the EU and I would like to provide better service. If that means nudging the customers towards a particular shipping service that'd be good knowledge to have. I'm sure Jason would be interested as well.

Tom
 
Although the US is EU's largest trading partner, there are no plans for a free trade agreement, the negotiations were formally closed in 2019.
There's a trade agreement between Canada and the EU. That doesn't change the brokerage fees. Basically the import fees break down like this:
  • Brokerage: What the courier charges to process the customs paperwork
  • Fees: Some couriers charge a separate billing fee
  • Duties: Import taxes that are negotiated in trade agreements and higher if there is no trade agreement
  • Tax: Typically sales tax or VAT that's the same as when you buy the product locally
So have a close look at the customs receipt. If the majority of what you're charged is brokerage and fees you might be able to lower those by choosing a different courier. But if the bulk of the import cost is duties and taxes the only way to get those changed is to pressure your government to change them.

There's another little detail to keep in mind: So I mentioned the free brokerage with FedEx. Yeah... About that... It's only free for the first five items on the invoice. After that they charge a per-line fee of a few dollars. So I make sure that all my FedEx shipments that go by FCA incoterms have no more than five unique items in them. It's more of a hassle. In that $2k order I mentioned, I had to break the order up into two to stay below the five-line limit. I also ordered from Digikey but that had more to do with parts availability.

Tom
 
Jason, I just found out the bergquist pads supplied with the F5M kit are non insulating.https://mm.digikey.com/Volume0/opasdata/d220001/medias/docus/5783/19-Q3-0.005-00-11.pdf There is basically no dc voltage across the pads due to the drain of the mosfets connected to the mosfets metal parts. However there will be ac voltage present, the value of such depending on how much output voltage the amp is putting out.Measuring the pad using a dmm and just the regular probes i get about 90 ohms. Not sure what that value would be when the larger metal surface of the mosfet is clamped down on it with pounds of pressure.You may want to run this by Nelson.
 
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It's always something...

Thank you for this correct information.

Looking at the BOM I see Digikey part BER1340, and I don't see it when I go to Digikey, but I trust that this is the case.

Fortunately it's not an issue with the anodized sinks from the store, which insulate into the megohms, but it would be
a problem with bare metal.

Also fortunately we have not yet shipped the second batch of these kits.

Of the 100 kits that have shipped, I am happy to mail different insulators to send to anyone with bare metal sinks.

You can send your address to nelson@passlabs.com

:snail: