The exchange rate of $1.21 to the pound isn't entirely unreasonable.
22% in customs charges is a little high, but that's not really the retailer's fault.
It's the "brokerage charges" that really take the piss. Somehow UPS think it's ok to charge me an extra £11 for the cost of taking the customs charges off of me and passing them on to the government. Which, as it's all done near-automatically, is just ridiculous.
So from now on I'll be keeping an eye out for places that ship from inside Europe. Until we leave that. Then I'll be reduced to buying only things shipped from places I can walk to, I assume.
Original post on Dreamwidth - there are
