Customs Declarations

The law requires "actual value", and is quite vague regarding how that might be calculated. The clear intent is to make it illegal to declare a value way different from some honest valuation. There are more than one way to honestly value something.

Consider a more liquid market than ebay, the stock market. And we ask, what is the actual value of XYZ?

And while the market is open, we immediately come to two actual values: bid, ask.

If we were to be shipping a share of XYZ, either would be legal "actual values".

But what if we just used the price of the most recently one sold? Again, legal actual value.

And lastly, can't we just use what the buyer paid for it, even if that was quite a while ago and considerably different from today's calculation? We can.

So we end up with four different ways to calculate actual value.
1. bid
2. ask
3. last
4. what was paid for this particular one

Just from a common sense, do what's right for buyer, it is shown ideal to use the lowest of those four.

How to map that on to an ebay transaction is not that tricky.

Nonsensically, there is yet a 5th actual value: retail value. Some Ebay sellers have declared this as the actual value, so that their buyer will feel that they received a bargain. Legal, but way dumb.

Sensibly, there is a 6th actual value: wholesale value, a standing offer to sell by a wholesaler.

More grey:
a. what seller paid for it
b. what seller knows he can find another one about like it for

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Practical matters:
1. Some countries charge as high as a 30% sales-tax like fee on imported value.
2. Gift declarations can be a red flag.
3. Nearly all countries allow customs free delivery of a package worth less than US$20.
4. Never, every use a value higher than ebay sales value. It might be legal, but it will cost your buyer money, and your buyer will definitely be unhappy.
5. Your buyer will have the opportunity to refuse to pay the fee. If they do that, seller has a problem. The package will not be delivered, and seller will end up refunding.
6. Most countries refund any tax paid if/when the item is returned.
7. The incoming country is allowed to open any package they choose, and overrule the declared value with some value they choose.