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Getting A Laptop With The Low U.S. Dollar
An anonymous reader submits "I am heading to the U.S. pretty soon and am keen to take advantage of the low US$ to buy a laptop. The differences in prices are astounding - on dell.com (US) you pay $2049 for a Precision M60 - in the UK this costs 1620.33UKP, or $2999. That is a fair difference! It makes it cheaper for me to fly to the US to buy it and carry it home than it is for me to buy it in the UK. Now, that said, it isn't particularly easy to find a place to buy a laptop from, since most of the places don't ship to the UK (or it takes weeks) and it is difficult to get stuff delivered to your hotel ... any suggestions of how I can get a good laptop in the New York area when I am only there for 4 days?"
It goes without saying I'm not affiliated with them in any way, just an extremely happy customer. The inicial cost might appear steep but it's offset by your first major spend, really.
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
Any good hotel (4 star and up, and good chain 3 stars) will sign for packages for you; just call the hotel, tell them you have a reservation, and ask how can you send a FedEx package to them for your personal delivery when you check-in. Get the name of the concierge/manager that gives you this information and ask for them by name on any follow-up calls. Give the info to Dell, make sure they put your name and "(Guest)" on the delivery and make it c/o of the person you have the name of, if possible. And don't forget to tip.
I can't imagine a decent NYC hotel not doing this; as a long-time business traveler, it's a perk you expect and is quite common.
Hey, be very careful, or Her Majesty's revenue collectors will nab you off the plane and charge you VAT on it.
I had that experience coming back to the UK during a break in working in the US, and the SOB's saw my newish Apple 5300, and whisked me off to a cash machine (ATM) to pay 300 quid (450 dollars). Which for a research assistant was a lot of money. Mofo's. They know their stuff, and the guy who got me (I wasnt hiding it btw, just wasnt declaring it either), said it is something very common to happen.
Anyway, I got the last laugh as their delaying me in the middle of a British Airways transfer from the international flight to a domestic one ending up costing BA a 2 hour security related work stoppage and a 737 sitting at its gate for 2 hours while they argued about who would take my dangerous transferred luggage off... apparently around a million quid.
Winton
Step 4...
shout DAMNIT as you realise that the power adaptor does not work so you need a new plug adaptor (cheap but inconvienient).
Step 5...
shout DAMNIT even louder when you try to type something and discover that the punctuation keys are completely different on a US keyboard to a UK keyboard. You can get round this with mappings but it is very annoying (not $1000 annoying but annoying nonetheless). If you were not aware of this already, then be aware as you will need to re-learn a few keys, and it can be very annoying if you are switching between US-UK computers/keyboards.
Warhammer forums
If the item has been used by the individual before returning to the UK, it is considered "personal effects". More details can be found here
It's something I'm interested in. Especially since the Dell Dimension XPS isn't available in the UK.
As a former Best Buy employee, I've seen this happen a lot.
It happened mostly during the holidays. People are visiting relatives in the states, and they're taking advantage of after-Thanksgiving sales and such.
Let me first say, the pricing has very little to do with the 'weak US dollar'. It's just simply cheaper to buy things like computers here. How many computer manufacturers are based in England, compared to the USA?
Basically, they'd give us the same reasons you are. They'd typically buy a machine for $2000 which would cost $3000 or more in England/wherever they were from. They'd buy a notebook bag and pack it all up and leave the box and everything at the store, so it looked normal when they went back through the airport.
We actually had some repeat customers every year, and they would buy more than 1 laptop, and sell them when they got home!
Oh, bear in mind--you'll be stuck with a US QWERTY keyboard.
Actually, although I'm a Brit living in Europe, I slightly prefer the US keyboard layout. I'm a programmer, mainly in C++ and Perl, so I use $ a lot more than the pound currency sign.
The real disaster is the Swiss keyboard. A bunch of characters you would never want to use (and I don't mean accents, I mean stuff like the paragraph sign and the degree sign) are really easy to type while essential characters like [ and { are odd contortions and ~ is a real challenge (as in, ask 10 Swiss-keyboard users how to type it and over half won't be able to answer even after 5 minutes experimentation).
But if the original poster wants a UK keyboard, you can buy keyboards separately in Europe for something in the region of $15, negligible in comparison with the saving on the rest of the system.
The simplest way to go is to get a mailbox in New York via a company like The Mail Box
No, the best way is to have it sent to the hotel where you'll be staying. Assuming you will be at a reputable international brand (Hilton, Sheraton, etc) and not one marked 'men only' in Harlem. Big hotels have recieving departments where shipments are logged and accounted for. Just call the concierge or bell captain and tell them you're arriving on the x-th and are expecting a package delivered a few days (or whatever) before you arrive. This gives you time to account for backorders and other delays in shipping.
No, it is not considered PERSONAL EFFECTS, UNLESS YOU HAVE OWNED FOR 6 MONTHS or so.
For all the rest of you suggesting claiming innocence if you are stopped, HM Custom & Excise have access to VERY comprehensive databases. If they suspect you just bought it, they will check up. I highly recommend if you are stopped that you tell the truth and dont attempt to conceal the fact you bought it. They will question you if they find a laptop in yoru baggage, and it will be childs play to find out that it was just purchased. You will then be subject to a much larger penalty.
See my posting below. The office who stopped me, actually ended up entertaining me with lots of stories about guys who deliberately "tattered" their laptops with sticky tape and the like to attempt to make it look used. Trouble is those things come with serial numbers. They are also on the look out for high end guitars as well apparently there's a brisk trade in Gibsen's etc.
Sure, try to go through the green channel with an innocent face, but if you are stopped, and asked, tell them you bought it in the US.
Winton