Tax Free 5DmkIII from Shanghai

[ookkerpak]

My friend is going to travel from Finland to Shanghai next month and I thought that I'd make him bring me a 5DM3 body. It should be somewhat cheaper to buy it tax-free from a country outside EU. China has value-added tax of 17% (I googled) so I should be able to save at least that.

So... I've tried to find a decent place to buy genuine Canon stuff, but I do not understand chinese and there is no-one to do the translation for me.

Any hints? Experience on shopping cameras from China? What's a good price for 5DM3 body there? Where to do the shopping?

This place (http://goshopshanghai.com/xing-guang-photographic-equipment-market-352.html) came up more than once. If nothing else comes up, I think I'll tell my friend to go there.

[kaihp]

My friend is going to travel from Finland to Shanghai next month and I thought that I'd make him bring me a 5DM3 body. It should be somewhat cheaper to buy it tax-free from a country outside EU. China has value-added tax of 17% (I googled) so I should be able to save at least that.

So... I've tried to find a decent place to buy genuine Canon stuff, but I do not understand chinese and there is no-one to do the translation for me.

Any hints? Experience on shopping cameras from China? What's a good price for 5DM3 body there? Where to do the shopping?

I'm located in China (although not Shanghai, so I cannot recommend specific shops). While China has VAT of 17%, there is also a luxury tax of 30% that you could get hit by. When I looked around for a 1.4x Extender III last year, I found that the price I got quoted in Beijing was above the price in Denmark.

The local starting price for the 5D3 (you must haggle) is about RMB 25000 (when I casually asked, they said 25K but immediately offered it for 24K RMB) but www.taobao.com (chinese ebay) lists the 5D3 down to about RMB 20000.
Since I can get the VAT back when exporting out of the EU, I ended up buying my 5D3 in Denmark since I have 2 years official warranty, although it was slightly more expensive.

As for translation from Chinese to English/Finnish/Swedish, translate.google.com is your friend (although it isn't perfect).

[simonxu11]

I believe Xing Guang is the largest photographic equipment market in Shanghai, so you found the right place.
The genuine Canon 5d3 is around $2830~$2950 at the moment.

[simonxu11]

My friend is going to travel from Finland to Shanghai next month and I thought that I'd make him bring me a 5DM3 body. It should be somewhat cheaper to buy it tax-free from a country outside EU. China has value-added tax of 17% (I googled) so I should be able to save at least that.

So... I've tried to find a decent place to buy genuine Canon stuff, but I do not understand chinese and there is no-one to do the translation for me.

Any hints? Experience on shopping cameras from China? What's a good price for 5DM3 body there? Where to do the shopping?

I'm located in China (although not Shanghai, so I cannot recommend specific shops). While China has VAT of 17%, there is also a luxury tax of 30% that you could get hit by. When I looked around for a 1.4x Extender III last year, I found that the price I got quoted in Beijing was above the price in Denmark.

The local starting price for the 5D3 (you must haggle) is about RMB 25000 (when I casually asked, they said 25K but immediately offered it for 24K RMB) but www.taobao.com (chinese ebay) lists the 5D3 down to about RMB 20000.
Since I can get the VAT back when exporting out of the EU, I ended up buying my 5D3 in Denmark since I have 2 years official warranty, although it was slightly more expensive.

As for translation from Chinese to English/Finnish/Swedish, translate.google.com is your friend (although it isn't perfect).

As a Chinese I am pretty sure there's no luxury tax on any camera related stuffs.

[ookkerpak]

Ok. Thanks for your replies.

I took it for granted, but actually I'm not sure... Do you get the VAT paid back in customs when taking the camera from China to Finland? In any case, it's a good deal to buy from China; cheapest price I can find in Finland is ~2800€. $2800 (= ca. 2200€) would already mean saving ~600€. IF the VAT is 17% AND they pay it back in customs it would mean saving ca. 1000€. Whoa!

Then again... (fingers crossed) IF there is this luxury tax of 30%... I'll have to buy a lens also. Bugger.

[kaihp]

Ok. Thanks for your replies.

I took it for granted, but actually I'm not sure... Do you get the VAT paid back in customs when taking the camera from China to Finland? In any case, it's a good deal to buy from China; cheapest price I can find in Finland is ~2800€. $2800 (= ca. 2200€) would already mean saving ~600€. IF the VAT is 17% AND they pay it back in customs it would mean saving ca. 1000€. Whoa!

Then again... (fingers crossed) IF there is this luxury tax of 30%... I'll have to buy a lens also. Bugger.

Listen to Simon on the luxury tax thing.

As for getting the tax back, sorry - no idea. I looked a Global Blue's homepage, but they seem not to operate in China. Maybe someone in the expat communities in Shanghai knows more.

[ookkerpak]

Yes, I'm listening to Simon allright.

Just planning in advance, so I won't hesitate to make purchases if the deal turns out to be too good for my budget

[leecheeyee]

http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=14522941548& 
Here is a link of shop in  www.taobao.com (ebuy like).The price is just referrence. It is better to ask some Chinese to help you to buy who owns experience. Some has been smuggled from HK without guarantee. Surely, it is most cheap. You need to check them whether second hand, and believe Canon qulity well. Hornestly, I had bought one  5D2 smuggled from Hongkong one year, and it perfect.

[simonxu11]

ookkerpak, as far as i konw there's no way to claim your tax back unless you purchase something in Hainan province which is China's second largest island but it's far from Shanghai, so please don't get too exited about that.

If a brand new 5D3 (any Canon related product) is sold by Canon China, the package should always have two stickers, one on the top and the other on the joint where you open the box. There's a series of code on the top sticker, you can enter the code into this website http://www.canon.com.cn/support/authenticity/index.html to check its authentication. The joint sticker(once off) has to be removed before you open the package.

It has to be smuggle product if there's no such stickers on the package. They are a bit cheaper and most of them are still genuine products from Canon HongKong. There's no difference except the warranty.

But I still suggest you to go for the genuine Chinese stock for peace of mind.