Shipping UK to Sydney - use a single agent or multiple ones?
Discussion
Hi
I've had a good read of the guide on this forum and am now in possession of an import approval - yay!
I have been getting quotes from the guys at Karman Shipping, Cargo Online and Complete Car Care about the costs involved and they are all coming out similar. So my question is it better to just go with 1 agent who then coordinates it all or separately contract with Karman and Cargo for each side? I heard that Cargo Online are good and can speed things along, but I want to make sure things go smoothly at the UK end as I am already in Sydney.
Related to this, Karman have said they will pick up my car in a transporter and take it to their depot in Barking, so do I need to have road tax or can I keep it to get a refund? Also Cargo's quote is for shipping from Southampton assume Karman needs to transport it down there?
Finally I know that I will need to have 3 child restraint points fitted when it arrives, however we have an Isofix seat in the car that cost us £300 so will we have any problems bringing it over (even though technically we cannot use it)?
Thanks
I've had a good read of the guide on this forum and am now in possession of an import approval - yay!
I have been getting quotes from the guys at Karman Shipping, Cargo Online and Complete Car Care about the costs involved and they are all coming out similar. So my question is it better to just go with 1 agent who then coordinates it all or separately contract with Karman and Cargo for each side? I heard that Cargo Online are good and can speed things along, but I want to make sure things go smoothly at the UK end as I am already in Sydney.
Related to this, Karman have said they will pick up my car in a transporter and take it to their depot in Barking, so do I need to have road tax or can I keep it to get a refund? Also Cargo's quote is for shipping from Southampton assume Karman needs to transport it down there?
Finally I know that I will need to have 3 child restraint points fitted when it arrives, however we have an Isofix seat in the car that cost us £300 so will we have any problems bringing it over (even though technically we cannot use it)?
Thanks
From my experience I would go with one only. If there were any savings in splitting it I would think they would be offset by the hassle of trying to juggle to agents. I used 2 once on a car from the US back to OZ, had to read the riot act to one of them for double dipping on things I already paid one agent for. Hope all goes well with the move. Cheers. Tony
You might want to get a quote for rollon rolloff from Southampton - I shippd my last two cars that way and it is significantly cheaper than using a container. All the UK new car exports get to Oz that way too. http://www.autoshippers.co.uk/ I found them very efficinet and easy to deal with. Just had an agent deal with all the formalities at the Oz end.
Only disadvantage is that you can't put anything in the car (personal effects etc) that you don't want to lose because you can't insure those.
Re : Isofix, that shouldn't be a problem. You'll just need to get the anchor points put in for the upper child seat tethers to pass the initial licensing inspection, then just use your isofix seats after that. The anchor points can be a complete pain in the ar$e to fit in some (most?) cars in my experience.
Only disadvantage is that you can't put anything in the car (personal effects etc) that you don't want to lose because you can't insure those.
Re : Isofix, that shouldn't be a problem. You'll just need to get the anchor points put in for the upper child seat tethers to pass the initial licensing inspection, then just use your isofix seats after that. The anchor points can be a complete pain in the ar$e to fit in some (most?) cars in my experience.
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