AussieCapitalist wrote:If you blokes are having trouble getting merchants to ship to Aus I suggest looking into a middleman service. You pay them then they give you an American address to their warehouse then they ship it to you. It can sometimes cost more but if you really want an item it is worth it.
I have used these blokes before and there are a few other ones around. Do some research.
https://www.myus.com/
I have used some of these services before for various items, the trouble I've had with them is
#1 Lots of stores (particularly gun stores) won't ship to these package forwarding companies, because they believe (and rightly so) that any packages being sent to that address will be then exported out of U.S, or wherever you are buying from and will potentially be in breach of ITAR/ a bunch of other regulations. There is a large list of all the known package forwarding companies, and a good amount of retailers simply won't ship to them if you enter a known package forwarding address.
#2 If you read the "what you cannot ship" section on that site it details a list of items they cannot legally ship to you which includes "Firearms, guns & accessories, including replicas, BB/pellet/airsoft/paintball guns, parts and projectiles, Ammunition, magazines & bayonets, Military training equipment, Military and law enforcement equipment, Thermal imaging, InfraRed or other night vision devices, Rifle scopes, laser pointing & aiming devices for firearms, Defense articles controlled under the US Munitions List as defined under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, Any dual-use or commercial article controlled under the Commerce Control List (CCL) as defined under the Export Administration Regulations, where the control status requires a Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) approved export license." All of which covers pretty much anything gun related at all. Now admittedly I've never actually tried sending them an item that was in breach of what they can ship, but they typically do open the original packaging and repack the products, as well as ask you to fill out customs declarations and such so I assume once they discover something they can't legally ship, they won't ship you the item and you would have to arrange for them to return it for you.
#3 If you do go ahead and get shipped an item they can't legally send to you and it gets stopped by U.S customs on the way out because the sender doesn't have the proper export licence, you will lose the item and be out whatever you paid for it + shipping and possibly face more severe repercussions.
There was actually a major update to the laws surrounding firearms exports from the U.S earlier this year which makes it easier to export a lot of parts and accessories, but most of the sites seem pretty slow to update and implement new policies so a large amount of items they claim they cannot export in reality they actually can but just won't.
Overall to me it seems there is a fair bit of risk in using these services for firearms parts and lots of ways to end up losing your money or the item, especially if you are trying to buy an item from the U.S since they are quite strict about firearm related exports, some of the European countries might be a bit safer to order from.