Will American retailers ship to Belize?
Tamrah Lozano
I ship things to Belize from American retailers through Joseph Freight. You just have to send them the link of whatever you need to buy online. The retailer then sends the item to the Joseph Freight warehouse and every month Joseph Freight ships your items to Belize. The can tell you the date that when the packages left their warehouses. They have warehouses in Dallas, Los Angeles, Chicago, etc.
Their rates depend on what you are shipping. For clothing, it...
I ship things to Belize from American retailers through Joseph Freight. You just have to send them the link of whatever you need to buy online. The retailer then sends the item to the Joseph Freight warehouse and every month Joseph Freight ships your items to Belize. The can tell you the date that when the packages left their warehouses. They have warehouses in Dallas, Los Angeles, Chicago, etc.
Their rates depend on what you are shipping. For clothing, it is about US $150 per barrel of clothes. One barrel can fit a good amount of clothing.
Posted December 1, 2014
Christian Burn
If you buy something on Amazon, they ship here to Belize; it is doable. You have to have a PO Box. Unfortunately, if you do that, you pay a fair bit of duty, so I do not know if it is really worth it. There are also providers of mail receiving services like in Canada we have mailboxes. It’s not just like having a PO box, but you can have someone in the store receiving packages or mail for you. We have UPS and we have FedEx in Belize, too. It is all very possible.
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If you buy something on Amazon, they ship here to Belize; it is doable. You have to have a PO Box. Unfortunately, if you do that, you pay a fair bit of duty, so I do not know if it is really worth it. There are also providers of mail receiving services like in Canada we have mailboxes. It’s not just like having a PO box, but you can have someone in the store receiving packages or mail for you. We have UPS and we have FedEx in Belize, too. It is all very possible.
The delivery will take a little longer than you would expect, but you can definitely do that. You just have to pay for it. But your mailing address for your credit cards generally speaking should be from the US. A good amount of retailers will actually ship directly to Belize.
I do know that there is a Qualified Retired Residency Program in Belize. The duties in Belize from importing are based on the goods. When you move to Belize and you sign up for the Qualified Retired Residency Program, you get a year to import whatever you want and need from the US as long as it is personal, and it will be duty free.
After a year and let us say you buy something from Amazon, for example. Belize will tend to charge you import duties. I had some things sent from the US to me here in Ambergris Caye, Belize. I had to go to the post office to receive the package, where they opened the box in front of me. They will open the box with you standing there, go through the box, and they will decide how much duty you have to pay.
If a friend sends you gifts they will not charge you duties if your friend who sent it put a value on the gift of zero dollars because it is a gift. If it's a brand new item like a CD player or an iPod, the Belizean authorities still decide on how much duty you have to pay
Electronic goods are something they always charge a duty on. It will probably not be too much, but there would be duty for sure on anything electronic. If a friend sends you a brand new apple MacBook Pro, the duty on that I believe it can be as high as 40% of the total cost of the laptop. It is very high and it is not an advantage to you for a laptop to be sent to you in Belize. However, you can buy laptops in Belize. They are trying to encourage people to buy electronics in Belize, since we have people selling electronics here and they pay the legitimate import fees. They try to sell their goods here in Belize, but without the import fees they cannot compete with the American market.
The delivery will take a little longer than you would expect, but you can definitely do that. You just have to pay for it. But your mailing address for your credit cards generally speaking should be from the US. A good amount of retailers will actually ship directly to Belize.
I do know that there is a Qualified Retired Residency Program in Belize. The duties in Belize from importing are based on the goods. When you move to Belize and you sign up for the Qualified Retired Residency Program, you get a year to import whatever you want and need from the US as long as it is personal, and it will be duty free.
After a year and let us say you buy something from Amazon, for example. Belize will tend to charge you import duties. I had some things sent from the US to me here in Ambergris Caye, Belize. I had to go to the post office to receive the package, where they opened the box in front of me. They will open the box with you standing there, go through the box, and they will decide how much duty you have to pay.
If a friend sends you gifts they will not charge you duties if your friend who sent it put a value on the gift of zero dollars because it is a gift. If it's a brand new item like a CD player or an iPod, the Belizean authorities still decide on how much duty you have to pay
Electronic goods are something they always charge a duty on. It will probably not be too much, but there would be duty for sure on anything electronic. If a friend sends you a brand new apple MacBook Pro, the duty on that I believe it can be as high as 40% of the total cost of the laptop. It is very high and it is not an advantage to you for a laptop to be sent to you in Belize. However, you can buy laptops in Belize. They are trying to encourage people to buy electronics in Belize, since we have people selling electronics here and they pay the legitimate import fees. They try to sell their goods here in Belize, but without the import fees they cannot compete with the American market.
Posted December 2, 2014
Irma Quiroz-Yuque - Belize Vacation Homes
You can buy online and have your purchase shipped to Belize.We do have a lot of set ups here where you can walk in, order something from Amazon, eBay, or some other regular Internet store and you can have it shipped here. The only thing is that, of course, you’re going to have to pay that extra little amount for duty and that varies so I can’t give you like a specific amount. I just ordered a door knocker, for example, from Amazon and I was able to get...
You can buy online and have your purchase shipped to Belize.We do have a lot of set ups here where you can walk in, order something from Amazon, eBay, or some other regular Internet store and you can have it shipped here. The only thing is that, of course, you’re going to have to pay that extra little amount for duty and that varies so I can’t give you like a specific amount. I just ordered a door knocker, for example, from Amazon and I was able to get it at a very, very good price and not pay much.
There are other techniques as well. For example, there is a company in California where we ship the goods we purchase online, and they ship it to us in Belize. The import fee is included in the shipping price, and it gets delivered right to us here.
(Clipper Faith Belize City, pictured.)
Posted October 27, 2015
Stewart Patton - U.S. Tax Services
Just like about every aspect of living in Belize, there's a way to accomplish your goal, but it might take just a little bit longer and/or cost just a little bit more. The two easiest ways to get products from Amazon (or another Internet retailer) to your home in Belize are as follows: 1. Use the services of a company like Aeropost. They give you an address in the US to ship the item to, then their US counterpart ships the item down here to...
Just like about every aspect of living in Belize, there's a way to accomplish your goal, but it might take just a little bit longer and/or cost just a little bit more. The two easiest ways to get products from Amazon (or another Internet retailer) to your home in Belize are as follows: 1. Use the services of a company like Aeropost. They give you an address in the US to ship the item to, then their US counterpart ships the item down here to Belize (by air). It'll get to you in about a week, and you'll have to pay a little duty (plus a service fee).
2. You can ship items to a friend/relative planning to visit you, and they can simply bring the items in their luggage.
(Companies that you can order from and sent by Aeropost, Belize, pictured.)
Posted November 30, 2015
David Berger - Tradewinds Hospitality at Orchid Bay
Yes, American retailers ship to Belize. There are shipping companies that are good at it. There are some that are based in Houston, some are based in Miami, Florida or in Atlanta. You can ship anything to one of these shippers and then they will bring it to Belize, import it, and do the duty for you. They even deliver it to you. It is not very cheap and you usually have to pay sales tax in Belize on brand new items when you bring them in but it is very efficient. Yes, American retailers ship to Belize. There are shipping companies that are good at it. There are some that are based in Houston, some are based in Miami, Florida or in Atlanta. You can ship anything to one of these shippers and then they will bring it to Belize, import it, and do the duty for you. They even deliver it to you. It is not very cheap and you usually have to pay sales tax in Belize on brand new items when you bring them in but it is very efficient. I ship a lot of stuff here. We buy online in the US because when you buy there, you just know what you’re getting while here in Belize, we don’t have that same luxury. We can buy from Amazon and have the item shipped to these shippers that I mentioned who are in the US.
Lots of people here buy from Amazon. We all use the shipper’s address in the port of Florida. They come here once a month. They leave on the same day of every month. So you can get pretty much whatever you want here in Belize. It just takes a bit more time to get it. It takes about two to three weeks for your order to arrive.
(View of Caribbean from Tradewinds Restaurant, Orchid Bay, Belize, pictured.)
Posted June 1, 2017