I’m moving to Bali sometime in 2003 and, as part of my preparations I emailed a few people to ask their advice on what to bring, what not to bring etc. I received masses of helpful info and thought it might be useful to anyone contemplating a similar move.
The general conclusions are
1. it’s not easy
2. it will cost
3. you probably won’t need half the stuff you plan to ship
4. bringing goods in without a KITAS or similar is difficult
5. perhaps best to ship to a friendly Balinese or an expat with a KITAS
Does anyone else want to contribute so we can build up an bank of knowledge on the subject?
Once I’ve moved (and recovered from the shock) I’ll be happy to relate my experiences.
I also received some advice on visas and I’ll post this as a separate topic.
Expat 1
· It's not that simple bringing in goods to Bali
· too many greedy fingers
· they can charge what they like in import duties.
· It's no use asking a shipping company here what the possible duties would be, as each case is taken on it's own merits, gauged by how much they think they can get from you.
· I will though, get details of a company a friend recently used, but his experience was a nightmare.
Expat 2
· I use TNT Express here in Bali
· They are located right on the bypass
· phone number is 0361 703 519
· Ask for the boss, Pak Hiffman
· Indonesian duty charges for incoming goods is generally 50%...so you'll likely have to declare very low values, otherwise you will be paying through the nose
Expat 3
· We have never shipped anything into Indonesia but we have heard some horror stories about trying to get things in, no matter what it is or what the value is
· Even more problems with electronic stuff. You will have to pick them up at customs office and they will try to get as much money from you as they can
· you can be assured it won't be a pleasant experience.
· Our suggestion is to bring the pieces you want with you on the plane
· You may have to give something to get it thru customs but most likely it will be cheaper than if you shipped it in
· You may even get thru with no problems at all. We've only had our luggage opened once in the last several entries.
· If they should ask you to open your luggage, just comply with the smile on your face, you'll do much better with a good attitude then getting upset.
· We did bring our own cutlery as they are not easily found in Bali.
· We also brought an espresso machine,
· but we ended up buying another one (De Longhi) at the Gourmet Garage.
Expat 4 ………. This guy has moved from Australia in the past few weeks;
· We stripped down our possessions as you are currently doing and still found that we brought too many things with us.
· We ended up shipping 16 boxes of our life long possessions but found that we really didn’t need to bring things such as toasters, kettles and kitchen ware as it is readily available here and at a reasonable cost.
· We had to make a "donation" to the friendly smiling customs men to have our boxes released.
· I have found that (and expected of course) that corruption is the backbone of this country. If you don’t rebel against it and use it to your advantage it will get you thru a lot of red tape quite quickly.
· A must is any medication that you might need and antiseptic is also a plus. They have similar types here but they really are not as good as the products that you already know.
· We sent books and photos and all seem to arrive ok. Some frames were damaged but mostly as they were packed professionally the majority were ok. We regret bringing them now as we should have left them in storage in Australia.
· We brought our cd's out of the cases in cd carry folders.
· other small personal items should be ok.
· For electrical goods we needed to buy a voltage stabiliser, works ok and you can easily buy adapters for the plugs here.
· You will definitely get a hard time about personal possessions coming to Bali if you are only on a holiday visa. They say that you should have a Kites to bring personal items into Bali.
Expat 5· If you don’t have a KITAS you can use someone else's name as the recipient (maybe the house owner of where you are renting).
· personally, I would rather have goods go to a Balinese person then to myself as this may affect dramatically how much duty is applied.
· getting electrical items and cutlery etc. is not a problem.
· Some of the electrical items in Bali look like (and may well be) 1980's models (fans in particular) but quality cutlery, mixers, TV's etc. are no problem.
Prospective Expat ……… this lady is moving in the next few weeks· You can ship your books "book rate" in an M bag (sea mail bag) from and to anywhere in the world. It holds about 3 boxes of books. That's a good way to get the books there.
· We took our CD's out of the plastic cases and put them in those CD books which diminishes the volume by about 85 percent
· You can pay the extra bag fee (up to 150 USD...depending on the airline) and send a cardboard box or the like as extra luggage on the airplane. It saves you having to deal with the customs freight nightmare and you can simply bribe your customs official on the spot for 10 dollars or so IF it so happens that you get searched. Take wet-naps with you and wipe off the chalk mark if they do mark your bag for inspection.
Visitor· Electrical goods are readily available at Matahari Dept Stores and seem to be of good quality.
· We bought only electric jug and mugs but they performed well.
· The stores are equal to those in Perth W.A. and to us were quite inexpensive.
· They also sell the whole range of goods one expects from this type of store.
The general conclusions are
1. it’s not easy
2. it will cost
3. you probably won’t need half the stuff you plan to ship
4. bringing goods in without a KITAS or similar is difficult
5. perhaps best to ship to a friendly Balinese or an expat with a KITAS
Does anyone else want to contribute so we can build up an bank of knowledge on the subject?
Once I’ve moved (and recovered from the shock) I’ll be happy to relate my experiences.
I also received some advice on visas and I’ll post this as a separate topic.
Expat 1
· It's not that simple bringing in goods to Bali
· too many greedy fingers
· they can charge what they like in import duties.
· It's no use asking a shipping company here what the possible duties would be, as each case is taken on it's own merits, gauged by how much they think they can get from you.
· I will though, get details of a company a friend recently used, but his experience was a nightmare.
Expat 2
· I use TNT Express here in Bali
· They are located right on the bypass
· phone number is 0361 703 519
· Ask for the boss, Pak Hiffman
· Indonesian duty charges for incoming goods is generally 50%...so you'll likely have to declare very low values, otherwise you will be paying through the nose
Expat 3
· We have never shipped anything into Indonesia but we have heard some horror stories about trying to get things in, no matter what it is or what the value is
· Even more problems with electronic stuff. You will have to pick them up at customs office and they will try to get as much money from you as they can
· you can be assured it won't be a pleasant experience.
· Our suggestion is to bring the pieces you want with you on the plane
· You may have to give something to get it thru customs but most likely it will be cheaper than if you shipped it in
· You may even get thru with no problems at all. We've only had our luggage opened once in the last several entries.
· If they should ask you to open your luggage, just comply with the smile on your face, you'll do much better with a good attitude then getting upset.
· We did bring our own cutlery as they are not easily found in Bali.
· We also brought an espresso machine,
· but we ended up buying another one (De Longhi) at the Gourmet Garage.
Expat 4 ………. This guy has moved from Australia in the past few weeks;
· We stripped down our possessions as you are currently doing and still found that we brought too many things with us.
· We ended up shipping 16 boxes of our life long possessions but found that we really didn’t need to bring things such as toasters, kettles and kitchen ware as it is readily available here and at a reasonable cost.
· We had to make a "donation" to the friendly smiling customs men to have our boxes released.
· I have found that (and expected of course) that corruption is the backbone of this country. If you don’t rebel against it and use it to your advantage it will get you thru a lot of red tape quite quickly.
· A must is any medication that you might need and antiseptic is also a plus. They have similar types here but they really are not as good as the products that you already know.
· We sent books and photos and all seem to arrive ok. Some frames were damaged but mostly as they were packed professionally the majority were ok. We regret bringing them now as we should have left them in storage in Australia.
· We brought our cd's out of the cases in cd carry folders.
· other small personal items should be ok.
· For electrical goods we needed to buy a voltage stabiliser, works ok and you can easily buy adapters for the plugs here.
· You will definitely get a hard time about personal possessions coming to Bali if you are only on a holiday visa. They say that you should have a Kites to bring personal items into Bali.
Expat 5· If you don’t have a KITAS you can use someone else's name as the recipient (maybe the house owner of where you are renting).
· personally, I would rather have goods go to a Balinese person then to myself as this may affect dramatically how much duty is applied.
· getting electrical items and cutlery etc. is not a problem.
· Some of the electrical items in Bali look like (and may well be) 1980's models (fans in particular) but quality cutlery, mixers, TV's etc. are no problem.
Prospective Expat ……… this lady is moving in the next few weeks· You can ship your books "book rate" in an M bag (sea mail bag) from and to anywhere in the world. It holds about 3 boxes of books. That's a good way to get the books there.
· We took our CD's out of the plastic cases and put them in those CD books which diminishes the volume by about 85 percent
· You can pay the extra bag fee (up to 150 USD...depending on the airline) and send a cardboard box or the like as extra luggage on the airplane. It saves you having to deal with the customs freight nightmare and you can simply bribe your customs official on the spot for 10 dollars or so IF it so happens that you get searched. Take wet-naps with you and wipe off the chalk mark if they do mark your bag for inspection.
Visitor· Electrical goods are readily available at Matahari Dept Stores and seem to be of good quality.
· We bought only electric jug and mugs but they performed well.
· The stores are equal to those in Perth W.A. and to us were quite inexpensive.
· They also sell the whole range of goods one expects from this type of store.