All About Pocket Knives

If I sent a knife, pocket or fixed blade, to the U.K. from abroad through the regular postal service, would it cause problems for the recipient? Are their restrictions on size, etc.? Many thanks.

I personally am not knowledgable about UK law, but there recently was a post in the Great Eastern Cutlery forum from a Britisher who seemed to know what he was talking about, and he said that in the UK it was unlawful to carry a knife with a cutting edge of three inches or longer. I assume that any knife with a cutting edge shorter than that would pose no problem, but that a longer knife might be confiscated by Customs.

you need to ask either zed or iron hoarder to name a few. they reside over there.

I Know its against the law in the U.K for the blade to lock in the open position. Spyderco makes a whole line of U.K. knives that don't lock.

When I've sent knives to the UK through the mail I had to fill out a customs form detailing what I was shipping. I stated it was slipjoint knives under 3 in. blade length and they went through with no problem.

If you want the knife to make it here without being confiscated by customs then it has to be a knife that cannot be flipped open in any manner. That means by either holding the blade or the handle and flipping it open with wrist action. The best bet is to either disassemble the knife or tighten the pivots if possible. Standard pocket knives will make it through without any problem as long as they have a good stiff back spring.

If the value filled in on the customs form is more than £40.00 then the recipient will have to pay about 20% in taxes plus another £8.00 in service fees that royal mail charges you for the pleasure of collecting taxes for the bunch of crooks that passes for government over here. ( They make US politicians and taxes look rather appealing)

Locking knives are legal to own and legal to carry WITH GOOD REASON.

For more and further details along with mentions of the knives that haven't made it through the zealots at Mt. Pleasant customs you can go search the threads over at http://www.britishblades.com

If I remember correctly sending by UPS means the package goes through a different customs office and they let through all sorts of stuff that the Mt.Pleasant zealots won't. The customs service over here has no oversight by the judiciary and reports to the crown and so things vary wildly. No one with deep enough pockets has come along to try and fix this travesty. In large part due to the fact that no politician or judge would do anything those cretins and troglodytes in the media could twist into being soft on weapons and knife crime.

Hope this helps.

A great help, thanks, and someone at britishblades said there's no size restriction on
legal patterns like traditional slipjoints and fixed blades. However, I'll certainly keep your
cost info. in mind now.

IH, after reading posts by you and 'Z', I was already sure I have no desire to live there but after this post, I'm pretty sure I don't even need to go back to visit. You Aussies, is Australia as bad as the UK with respect to taxes, firearms and knives?