When ordering a car from abroad, the buyer can be deceived by unscrupulous customs brokers. The head of the autocriminologist expert center Maxim Shelkov told socialbites.ca about this.
“The customer of the car can be very seriously deceived by substituting the original payment documents, the so-called invoice, on which the customs office calculates the customs payment,” said Shelkov.
According to him, unscrupulous customs brokers give the customer an invoice indicating the full cost of the imported car and present customs with a fake invoice on which the price of the car can be reduced by half.
“Such low-value invoices later show up at customs checks and the buyer is forced to pay extra to ensure that the electronic title of his car is not cancelled. At the same time, unscrupulous brokers want to transfer the entire payment to the accounts of individuals, not their companies, and it is very difficult for the buyer to prove that he transferred the money specifically for customs clearance,” added Shelkov.
The expert advised that to minimize the risk during remote customs clearance of a car, the car owner should conclude a formal agreement with the broker, including using electronic document management, and personally transfer the customs payment using customs details.
It was previously known which cars were will become more expensive in the secondary market.