On Thu, 14 Oct 2004, Dwight K. Elvey wrote: May you never have to ship *anything* in or out of Mother India. Especially anything electronic or mechanical - used or not, country of origin notwithstanding. We had American-made audio gear, and there were duties levied on the shipping of items for repair/return - both friggin' ways... one of the reasons that The Subcontinent is nowhere near as advance technologically as they could be. The are increasing calls for customs tariff reforms, but the (real) bottom line is that billions of Rupees flow into the Government (and various pockets) anually from this source alone... to which you need to add the "speed money" that is often required to inusure your goods make it to the loading dock intact. ;} Then there's Mumbai (Bombay) who have their *own* "import-export" duties... it would be like New York decreeing that all goods coming in to the city have to be levied... this is called 'Octroi' in Mumbai. It is not levied on airline chacked baggage - so, when we had say, a trade show to do, we'd take the *entire* thing on the plane as checked bags - divided up among the attendees. It always was a lot cheaper than trucking it in and paying the goddam tax. Cheers John