donating and carnets???
 

We will be riding down the west coast of Africa, starting in November. Our mate was going to buy a 4x4 in Lon and follow us down (handy support vehicle!). Have booked flights etc, and getting visas sorted etc... we are getting carnets through Kudu in the UK (at this stage), -We are Aust. Will need them for car too obviously, but it will not be worth shipping it back to th uk or to au to sell or keep or whatever.... so we thought we would donate it to medicins sans frontiers, a un ran programme, local charity or whoever we can find that will benefit from having a vehicle... cant find out if whether we get a receipt of donation, this will satisfy carnet requirements, as weould not have sold or profited from it.... Does anyone know whether we can do this??? Or what else to do with the car? Our mate will be flying out from Accra. We will continue on bikes down to Cape Town, and ship bikes back to Kudu in London for buy-back.... Thanks, Carolyn :scooter:

Hi there
I suggest you contact the RAC in the UK. They originally provide the Carnets, not Kudu... They are extremely knowledgeable and you can contact Paul at this email addy: pkgowen(AT)rac(DOT)co(DOT)uk

Happy travels:thumbup1:

What's Kudu?

I'd call Paul at RAC directly as you won't always receive a response to your email as he's usually pretty busy. Would doubt the whole donating to charity thing as what's to stop the charity selling on? I'd have thought you would either have to import it or ship it back.

The Carnet for the bikes should be cheap enough, you are riding cheap bikes and not expensive BMWs right?

As for the car, it MIGHT be possible to send the Carnet back to the RAC once you are out of the last country where it applies and then sell to another UK overlander who could drive it back. I know when I left Iran and had arrived in Turkey, I could have sent my Carnet back to the RAC to release the deposit.

Carolyn
the concept of the CDP is a financial bond/deposit/insurance to satisfy the authorities of countries requiring a CDP that, in the event that you abandon/leave/donate/wreck etc etc your vehicle and it does not leave their country that they have a legal recourse to obtain funds via PG at the RAC to cover what they perceive to be lost import tax.
There maybe a way to 'donate' it to local Customs on the proviso that it goes to the charity you have chosen although IMHO, that's very high risky business as there would be nothing to stop said country from making a claim against you anyway afterwards- try to unravel that problem from a distance..... and your 'gift' could turn out to be a very expensive one -not recommended.

tour operator

Ah yes, the company we saw at the bike show that were organising a 3 week tour from London to Kathmandu. I remember them now.

To expand on the excellent advice given above: you must export the car from any country that stamps the carnet. If you then donate it in another country where the carnet is not stamped, the car will have to be properly imported, with documentation, to be able to be registered and used. If you send a copy of this import documentation together with the carnet (certificate of presence on the last page completed by customs in the country of import) then all is legit and you get your deposit back.

You could also use this procedure in a country where the carnet has been stamped, but in either case you may find the paperwork and cost prohibitive. (Which is the reason a carnet is used in the first place.)

It may be best to budget for return transport of the car or for donating it to customs, who would then discharge the carnet.

Once you are there other options may open up, possibly involving bakhsheesh.:oops2:

thanks everyone....sigh... its all such a pain in the butt really. donate it to customs? really?

I was also lookking on the sub-saharan travel page and there are lots of people who say you dont need carnets anyway.

The problem I guess really is that we live in Australia, so sending anything back the UK is pointless for us personally, and we are not allowed to import anything into Australia....

If you are in a country where a carnet is not required and you get a laissaiz passer.... what happens then if you leave the vehicle there - ag : ivory coast. if its easier we'll just to another country.
We are paying to ship the bikes back to the UK because Kudu will buy them back...which might cover the cost of the shipping... essentially, we are buying bikes and car to use and cant keep any of them or sell them or anything, so budgeting to blow the carnet would really blow yhings out, and shipping the car back is thousands....

P.S Kudu (expeditions)... we are doing a self -ride option with them.. were going to do a tour for some of the trip, but the dates werent suitable.

thanks,

Carolyn

:scooter: