So here in the UK we’ve become accustomed what’s known as the ‘Apple tax’. Whenever a product is launched in the UK, we always see a significant price increase compared the US price. It has been argued that our higher prices are down to extra costs, such as customs and VAT. To this way say: nonsense!

As an example, we worked out the cost of an imported MacBook Pro from the US, versus one purchases here in the UK.

US Price: $2,299 U.S. dollars (£1,488.41)

UK Price: £1,899.00

VAT (17.5%): £253.47

Handling Fee, Import Duty at 3.5%: £52.09

Calculation: £1,488.41 (MBP) + 253.47 (VAT) +  52.09 (Customs) = £1793.97

Total Cost of Imported US MacBook Pro: £1793.97

Apple’s UK Price Bump = £105.03

From this we can see, even after an expenses, there’s still a significant price-bump on the product. Remember, this is just one product we picked at random – we’ve seen higher price gaps on other products in the Apple store.

Our answer is, if you know someone with a student card – get them to buy it for you – the 14% discount makes a big difference. That, or get a friend in the states to ship you one over. Postage would cost less than the ‘Apple tax’.

We found a nice tool for calculating your import duty: Duty Calculator from Bundle Box – who are also great for ordering/importing products from the US.