Hi
Can anyone help with advice or suggestions on this issue? The information below may also be of use to anyone sending goods to Vietnam.
My son works as an English teacher in Saigon/HCM City and has done for the last two years. During his trip to the UK over the summer of 2022, he broke his iPhone and left it with me for repair. The arrangement was for me to ship it to him when it was fixed.
I did so, via FedEx, in a small package that cost around £30.
It was stopped and blocked at Vietnam Customs because they won't allow the transmission of any 'used goods'!
After weeks of delay we got information from the shipping agent as follows:
'Dear Sir,
As your confirmation: PHONE in this shipment is USED PHONE, not new 100%.
In Viet Nam regulations (Decree 69/2018/ND-CP, Circular 12/2018/TT-BCT, Circular 11/2018/TT-BTTTT), USED ITEMS are prohibited items, they are not allowed to imported into Viet Nam.
Therefore, this shipment are not allowed to imported into Viet Nam and can't be released from Customs.
FedEx US will work with shipper for final disposition.
Pls kindly note that almost USED ITEMS are not allowed to imported into Viet Nam.'
Even explaining that this phone belongs to my son and he was trying to get back his own personal possession made no difference. It was just permanently blocked.
The package was held up for almost 4 months and it took further payments for its return to the UK, together with a payment for import duties!
I now have the phone back in London and my son is not due a trip back here until July of 2023.
Does anyone know of a reliable method of reuniting him with his phone? Clearly, post and couriers are not going to be a solution.
Any advice, suggestions or workarounds would be helpful.
Thanks