CNC Imports to the UK: Has Anyone Tried the Forwarding Company Route?

Has anybody made the bold move?

I saw the factory that builds the Itech 6090/ Laguna IQ machines on Alibaba.

I chatted to one of their sales people and they told me Itech has an exclusive rights to sell that machine in the UK so they could not sell me one ?

Are there any other machines similair and could anybody recommend where to buy?

Hey @dvddvd,

Yeah, I’ve looked into this a fair bit in the past, you're not alone in thinking about going direct to the source. The factory behind the Itech 6090/Laguna IQ style machines is often based in Jinan, and yeah, some of them claim to have exclusivity deals with UK distributors like Itech, which technically restricts them from selling the exact same spec direct to UK buyers.

That said, a lot of these factories do have sister models or "unbadged" alternatives that are 95% the same machine, just without the branded nameplate. Worth asking them directly if they can offer a ‘custom’ version or slight model variation, sometimes that’s their way around the exclusivity clause.

A couple of things to be aware of if you're importing direct:

CE compliance: Most Chinese machines aren’t truly CE marked, even if the sticker’s on there. If you're planning to run it in a commercial space or get insurance, this can be an issue. Some have the CE mark but actually, that just stands for China Export.

Electrical standards: Make sure the control electronics, spindle, and VFD are compatible with UK power and aren’t using fake or under-rated components, the later being a big one on cheap VFDs.

Info & After Sales Support: Buying direct means you’re pretty much on your own, so if something fails, you're the engineer. But if you’re technically minded, it's often not a deal breaker.

Import costs: Don’t forget to factor in VAT, import duty, customs clearance fees, and potentially a bit of back-and-forth with the freight forwarder.

As for alternatives, have a look at the 6040 or 6090 range from the likes of:

Omni CNC
StyleCNC
Quick CNC
XYZTech / EagleTec

Some of these will do a better job of supporting you and may be more flexible on machine spec. If you're not in a rush, I’d also recommend keeping an eye on the second-hand market here in the UK. Some serious bargains pop up all the time, especially older Isel, Denford or Boxford machines, some are even with retrofits already done.

Hope that helps!, let us know what you're leaning towards or gone for (i appreciate this thread is a few months old).

Another possibility is to get a product shipped to a forwarding company in the EU or some other destination where the alleged exclusivity doesn't apply.

I recently bought a couple of ArcCaptain welders (MIG, TIG and spool torch) using forward2me. That made me appear to be in Germany, as they don't currently sell to the UK (because of Brexit presumably). It was quick and cheap. You can choose USA, Germany, Japan or Turkey with them. If you change your country selection in Alibaba or AliExpress, you can see if they will ship to that region and how much the price would be.

I suspect the "warranty" would still be valid if you used a forwarding company but you'd obvs need to cover shipping back via the same forwarding address.

Both machines had minor damage but this was almost certainly due to the talentless clots in their white vans at this end.

That’s a clever workaround, @Muzzer, hadn’t even thought about using a forwarding service like that for machinery.

forward2me seems to open a lot of doors for stuff we “can’t” get in the UK post-Brexit. I imagine with the right prep and comm's with the seller, it could be a solid option for anyone trying to get around these so-called exclusivity deals.

Would be interesting to hear if anyone here has actually gone this route for a CNC or other large kit, and how the experience stacked up in terms of cost, transit time, and (importantly) damage risk.

When the forwarding company receives your shipment, you have to choose the courier for the second leg over to the UK. I don't know if their partners would ship large items - or if they did, whether the cost would be a problem. You still have to pay the Brexit tax on imports when it comes into the UK.

If considering this route, you can enter the dimensions and weight on their site to see what the estimated courier costs would be. The seller can probably give you that info.

This is what I paid for the Arc Captain TIG200PACDC:

- £441.81 purchase cost from AliExpress, including taxes and carriage to German address.
- £97.52 Brexit tax and associated UPS admin .
- £44.16 Forward2me payment for the UPS shipment. I assume that incudes some sort of commission for their forwarding service. They also have to open the shipment to check the contents, then reseal it.

That's a total of £583.49 delivered to a UK address. It's a 31% markup but as you can see, a fair bit of that was the Brexit tax and associated UPS admin which would have applied anyway. The forwarding bit itself was only 10% of the original price.