Shipping Personal Belongings to France

[nantookies]

Hello!

My husband will be attending INSEAD in France for the next year and so we will both be getting long-stay visas. As we're currently living in Hong Kong and plan on making a side trip back home to Canada prior to France, we thought it would be easier to ship our belongings directly from here to France. Other students though have been getting charged with duties and taxes upon receiving their shipment in France so we wanted to make sure we're aware of all the costs.

We'll be shipping our items via HK Post (surface) so is there a way to avoid duties and taxes on shipping personal belongings? We're only in France for a period so all our items will be leaving the country when we leave.

Thank you!

[Bevdeforges]

You need to make very clear on the customs documents that you fill out to ship your stuff that these are used household belongings being shipping in connection with a move to France. Not sure how best to do that, but you might talk to a shipper or customs clearing agent to ask advice.
Cheers,
Bev