Benefits of eu.ravvast.com for EU clients

Why is there a separate website for the EU countries? What if I ordered on ravvast.com (instead of eu.ravvast.com) in the EU country?

When you buy an instrument from Russia (even with a huge discount!) you will have to pay an enormous customs fee at the receipt of the good (20%-40%). So, especially for the EU clients, we opened a warehouse in Estonia, on the territory of the EU to rescue you from paying this ridiculously big import charge! 

But you still free to choose:

- If you pay in USD on ravvast.com, you need to pay full taxes by yourself.

- If you pay in EUR on eu.ravvast.com, you save on taxes.

One of our buyers explained this better than anyone:

" I'll give you a made up example to show you how it works.

A company outside the EU makes a product and it costs them 300 to make. They sell it for 500 to you inside the EU. And they ship it at a cost of 50. So you have paid 550.

When that product arrives in the EU, you will have to pay duties (usually 3 or 4%, but depends on the product and which country you are in) plus a customs fee, and then you will pay value added tax on top.

In the case of NL, I would pay 550, +3% plus 20 handling fee, and then 21% VAT, which is a total of 709. The company outside Russian can't claim back any tax, and as a consumer, neither can you.

When the same company ships the same product to their own entity in the EU, they follow the same process, but of course, they don't charge themselves the full retail price, but their own internal company to company price. Let's argue that as 350. Of course, the shipping is also likely to be cheaper, as they are sending in bulk. And the customs fee is per shipment not per product. Duties and taxes are the same. So now the EU cost price is, say 425.

When they now sell this product from inside the EU to inside the EU, they have to add local shipping (cheaper) and then VAT again. so you would pay 425 +21%. Except, that means there's no profit. Which is a bit silly. So now they sell you the product for 650 including the VAT. Their EU company will also get a rebate for part of those taxes.

So you end up paying less in the end, and they end up still making a good profit. Until they need to move that profit back to the non-eu country, when they will either need very creative accounting or to pay more taxes.

So in short - with almost any product imported from outside the EU, the consumer is paying taxes on top of taxes and sometimes on top of taxes... and don't forget you'll also suffer or profit, from currency exchange as well."

-Nick Stevens(https://www.facebook.com/ndstevens)

Hopefully,  we managed to answer your questions. Don't worry if you haven't ordered your RAV yet! We think now is the exact right time to do that.