Shopping Missy

Last December, I was trying to stay away from driving to the mall because I knew the traffic would be terrible. With much free time at home coupled with my unused shopping energy, I ended up shopping online.  I am not new to online shopping as I have lived overseas where it's convenient. Back to my story -  I tried having personal items delivered here (in Makati) from strawberrynet.com . Ordered mid of December, tracking stated it arrived here in the Philippines January 2 but I received a notification from the Makati Post Office January 20. The notification was stating that I should personally claim my parcel (no doorstep delivery for parcels via the post office). Upon claiming, I was surprised with how much I needed to pay as "custom taxes." I had expected duty taxes around 12% as that's our VAT rate here in the Philippines but I was charged P1,223 for a P3,257 worth of items. That is 37.5% TAX!! Here is how it was computed: Item cost (2 small perfum