In which I contribute to Her Majesty’s Coffer

So the patterns arrived. Unfortunately I always forget about import charges – a whopping £11 on goods worth only £15.30. Actually most of it is Royal Mail’s handling charges.

The guy at the post office told me I had just missed the threshold for free import by 30p. Turns out that on goods worth less than £15 there is no charge. So one less pattern and I would have saved some money. Bummer.

In the end these patterns worked out to be £6.04 per pattern. How I wish I still live in the States sometimes.

So what do rest of you UK folks do? Where do you get dirt cheap Big 4 patterns from? Or do you stick to Burda magazines for affordable patterns?

0 comments on “In which I contribute to Her Majesty’s Coffer

  1. Thankfully us Aussies don’t get slugged with import charges unless the total is MUCH higher (can’t remember what it is but I think it’s around $1000). Recently I noticed a jump in postage costs from sp.com & vogue so I’ve actually bought a few downloadable patterns lately to avoid that (of course then there’s the tedium of printing them and sticking them together to deal with).

    • I’ve yet to try the downloadable patterns. I’ve got a few downloaded, but the printing and taping seem a bit of a hassle, so never got around to them. Shame the US big 4 pattern companies don’t offer downloadable patterns like Burda.

      • The printing and taping is a hassle. The Big 4 do offer downloadable patterns at sewingpatterns.com – that’s where I’ve bought some when they’ve been on sale (usually not as cheap as the paper ones but when you take the shipping into account, they’re cheaper).

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