Buying Japanese Pokémon cards from the UK: fees, VAT and customs

By Harrison King. Updated 11 November 2026.

A Lugia listed on Mercari Japan at ¥15,999 came to £110.60 at a UK door in the example below. That's 46% more than the listing price once the proxy's fees, shipping, 20% import VAT and Royal Mail's £8 fee are added. Most of that gap can't be avoided, but the proxy you use and how you ship can change it by £10 or more.

This guide covers buying a card through a proxy and posting it to the UK. Figures were checked in November 2026.

You need a proxy

Sellers on Mercari Japan, Yahoo! Auctions and Rakuma only post inside Japan. A proxy buys the card for you, receives it at its warehouse in Japan and posts it on to you. The two most people use are Buyee, which is Mercari's official overseas partner, and ZenMarket.

What they charge, as of November 2026:

	Buyee	ZenMarket
Service fee	¥500 per order	¥800 per Mercari or Yahoo! Auctions item (less for some shops)
Cover	Standard Plan ¥500 per order (damage, loss, and items that don't match the listing), or Lite with no cover	Included on Japan Post EMS and airmail parcels
Payment fee	None	From 1%, depending on how you pay
UK VAT	Not charged, so it's collected at your door	Charged at checkout on parcels up to £135

Both change their fees from time to time, so check the fee page before a big purchase.

Shipping from Japan

For one card, or a few, most people use Japan Post's International Air Packet. It's tracked and priced by weight. To the UK it costs ¥880 up to 100 g, ¥1,060 up to 200 g and ¥1,240 up to 300 g. A card in a toploader weighs very little, so it's the proxy's packaging that sets the price. Your proxy weighs the parcel and quotes the real figure before it ships.

Couriers (DHL, FedEx and UPS) are faster but cost several thousand yen even for one card. They make sense for expensive cards or big orders. They also charge their own fee for collecting VAT, usually £10 to £12 instead of Royal Mail's £8.

Import VAT and customs duty

What you pay depends on whether the cards in the parcel are worth more than £135. Shipping doesn't count towards the £135.

£135 or less

No customs duty.
20% VAT on the cards plus shipping. The rules say the seller should charge it at checkout, but Japanese sellers and most proxies don't. Royal Mail then holds the parcel and asks for the VAT plus an £8 handling fee before delivering it. Parcelforce also charges £8.
ZenMarket is the exception. Since March 2026 it charges UK VAT at checkout on parcels within the limit, so there's nothing to pay at the door and no £8 fee.

Over £135

2% customs duty. Trading cards come under commodity code 9504 40 00 00, which HMRC has confirmed in an advance tariff ruling. Goods made in Japan can come in duty-free under the UK-Japan trade agreement, but only with proof of origin, which proxies rarely provide. Plan on paying the 2%.
20% VAT on the cards, shipping and duty together.
Royal Mail or Parcelforce's £8 fee (£25 if the parcel is worth over £900), or the courier's fee.

When Royal Mail is holding a parcel, it leaves a "Fee to Pay" card or sends a message with a reference number. You can pay online at royalmail.com/pay-a-fee, and it's delivered after that.

Worked examples

These use the European Central Bank rate on 9 November 2026 (¥1 = £0.004719) and assume your bank or card adds 1.5% when it converts currency. Shipping is an estimate for a single card by Air Packet.

A ¥15,999 card through Buyee, by Japan Post


Card	£75.50
Buyee service fee	£2.36
Buyee Standard Plan	£2.36
Shipping (estimate)	£5.00
Currency conversion	£1.28
Import VAT, 20%	£16.10
Royal Mail handling fee	£8.00
Total	£110.60

The same card through ZenMarket


Card	£75.50
ZenMarket service fee	£3.78
ZenMarket payment fee	£0.79
Shipping (estimate)	£5.00
Currency conversion	£1.28
UK VAT, 20%, charged by ZenMarket	£16.10
Total	£102.45

The VAT is the same. Almost all of the difference is Royal Mail's £8 fee, which you don't pay when VAT was charged at checkout.

A ¥42,300 Charizard ex SAR (151, 201/165) through Buyee, by Japan Post


Card	£199.61
Buyee fees	£4.72
Shipping (estimate)	£5.00
Currency conversion	£3.14
Customs duty, 2%	£4.09
Import VAT, 20%	£41.74
Royal Mail handling fee	£8.00
Total	£266.30

Once the card is over £135, the 2% duty applies. It's small next to the VAT.

Ways to pay less

Put several cards in one parcel. You pay for shipping once and Royal Mail's £8 fee once. The VAT doesn't change, and if the parcel goes over £135 you'll pay the 2% duty, which is usually less than the shipping and fees you save.
Under £135, compare the proxies. For a single card, ZenMarket charging VAT up front saves the £8 door fee. That's almost all of the £8.15 difference in the examples above, because the two proxies' fees come out about the same for one card.
Don't ask anyone to mark the parcel as a gift or declare a lower value. It's customs fraud, and if the parcel is lost, the cover only pays out on the declared value.

What's changing

The UK government has confirmed that the £135 duty relief will end by October 2028 at the latest, so small parcels will pay customs duty too. For trading cards that's the 2% rate, so the difference is small.

If there is anything I got incorrect, please correct me at harrison@yenlens.com.