Buying From India
You will be pleased to know that buying and importing from India is rather more straightforward than you may expect.
Why Import From India?
Let’s assume you addressed the question ‘why import from India?’ and have sourced the product you want to buy and agreed payment terms with your supplier – so you are good to go.
Getting Freight From India
The next step is to consider the geography of India. Unlike China for example where most factories that export are in the coastal region, Indian factories can be located anywhere, including vary far inland. This is important for two reasons, if you are buying on Incoterms ‘ex works’ you may have a large collection cost to pay so you will have to factor this in to your costings, see our previous post for more details on Incoterms. Furthermore you will also have to consider the time it will take to collect your shipment from the factory and deliver it to the port. This could take up to a week, depending on how far away from a port the factory is.
Sea Freight From India
The port your shipment is taken to will depend what region for supplier is in. Broadly speaking India separates into three for sea transport services, Mumbai (formerly Bombay) and associated ports of JNPT, Nhava Sheva and Mundra for the west of India, which has the quickest transit of 18/20 days to the UK. South of India is covered by the ports of Chennai and also Tuticorin and for the east of India the hub port is Kolkata, previously called Calcutta. This leaves one area of India out – the North. Imports from the north of India are invariably sent via a hub in Delhi which as you will realise from a quick look at google maps is very far from the sea. If you were to go to Delhi ‘port’ you would find a very large container terminal where all containers are loaded onto a train and sent to one of Mumbai’s ports, with the journey taking about a week.
India Freight Rates
India freight rates vary according to the port of departure, the journey from Kolkatta for example is very much longer than the one from Mumbai and the costs are different accordingly. If you are looking for container shipping costs from India to UK the team at K&L Freight can advise on India freight rates, just e-mail us, or give us a call.
What Can I Import From India?
If you are concerned about ‘what can I import from India?’ or maybe you have asked the question do I need an import license from India? you will be pleasantly surprised to learn that virtually anything can be imported from India and without an import license too, with the obvious exceptions such as firearms and other contentious products that would be illegal to retail in the UK, or at least would need a licence to do so.
Not only will K&L Freight offer you a very competitive freight rate with a true door to door service with all domestic transport and customs brokerage included in the price, we will also guide you through the whole process of importing from India in order all goes according to plan.
If you want to discuss importing into the UK from India in more detail or want more information, why not give us a call or e-mail us and we will be pleased to help.