Receiving electronics from overseas in Japan

[thepie]

My friend wants to send me a cellphone as a gift for this Christmas, but I have never received electronics from overseas (except from Amazon), so I am a little bit confused about taxes/duties/customs. It seems that I somehow have to pay the duties and taxes after the item arrives in Japan, but I am totally clueless about how to do it. Will I get some bill in my mail or will the delivery service collect the charge from me? I've heard taxes for electronics are quite reasonable here, but I just have no idea.

Also, do you have any recommendation on which service to use to ship to Japan from the US? I checked Fedex and DHL but they are both exorbitantly expensive, charging over 80$ for a 1lbs package (the cellphone is only 300USD). USPS is a no since they do not ship cell phones. Now I'm thinking of using some forwarding service like BorderLinx - their rates are much more reasonable, but it seems quite cumbersome to have my friend send it to them and get the package forwarded to me.

Any advice is appreciated. Thank you.

 

[Mike Cash]

Have you made sure you'll actually be able to use it here with your carrier with no problem?

 

[thepie]

Yes, the phone should work fine with Softbank and NTT Docomo.

 

[Glenski]

You will not be taxed. I got an iPod in the mail from a friend with no prob, no questions.

As mentioned, be 100 percent sure a foreign phone will actually work her. I am dubious.

 

[thepie]

You will not be taxed. I got an iPod in the mail from a friend with no prob, no questions.

As mentioned, be 100 percent sure a foreign phone will actually work her. I am dubious.

Thank you. About getting foreign phones to work here, most of recent smartphones should work fine with Softbank and Docomo since they now use WCDMA, which is a very widely adopted international standard. Just make sure that the phone supports Softbank/Docomo's frequency (Softbank uses 2100 and 850/900 AFAIK, I'm not sure about Docomo)