CustomsLookup

Exporting: what your buyer pays on arrival

The same tariff, read from the other side of the deal.

Every other part of this site answers the importer: here is the code, here is the duty, here is what it lands at. A seller has the same shipment in front of them and a different set of questions about it. What will my buyer be charged when it arrives, who charges them, does a small consignment escape it, do I quote a price that includes it, and what has to be written on the invoice for any of that to work.

These 7 guides answer those five questions for 10 of the 13 destinations this site prices from duty rates it holds, out of the 20 the calculator will price a shipment into. The other 3 hold too few duty rows to write a guide on. Every figure in them is read from the same tariff rows the code pages serve, and a shipment priced in a guide prices the same in the duty calculator, because both go through one function. Every rule in them is quoted from the destination's own regulation or published guidance, and where a rule could not be read the guide says so and states nothing.

The 7 guides

Exporting to United States The duty free allowance a small consignment used to travel under is gone, so the question a seller has to answer is no longer whether the shipment is small enough. 89 codes priced, 0% to 32% duty · FOB basis Exporting to United Kingdom The customs value includes what the seller charges for carriage, so the way an invoice is written changes the duty even when the goods and the price do not. 110 codes priced, 0% to 16% duty · CIF basis Exporting to Germany The tariff is the Union's and the tax is Germany's, so a rate that is right for Germany is right for every member state and the tax beside it is not. 106 codes priced, 0% to 17% duty · CIF basis Exporting to Portugal Portugal charges the same tariff as Germany on everything this site has put to both, which is what makes it worth reading as a Union entry point rather than as a country. 106 codes priced, 0% to 17% duty · CIF basis Exporting to Canada The value for duty is taken at the place of direct shipment, so freight to Canada is outside it, and the invoice has to show enough for a border officer to see that. 106 codes priced, 0% to 18% duty · FOB basis Exporting to Australia Duty and GST are worked out on two different values of the same shipment, which is the one thing about Australia a seller pricing DDP has to get right. 114 codes priced, 0% to 5% duty · FOB basis Exporting to European Union One tariff, one valuation rule and four different VAT rates: the duty a seller quotes is the same wherever the goods enter the Union, and the tax is not. 92 codes priced, 0% to 17% duty · CIF basis

What each guide can and cannot source

The figures are the same everywhere: read from a published schedule, checked, dated. The RULES are not. A commercial invoice requirement is a document, and some publishers serve one to a program and some do not. This is which is which, because a reader deciding what to put on an invoice is entitled to know whether the page in front of them is quoting a regulation or declining to.

Guide Answers for Codes priced Duty Rules quoted
United States United States 89 0% to 32% 2 quoted from source
United Kingdom United Kingdom 110 0% to 16% 1 quoted from source
Germany Germany 106 0% to 17% None: the publisher could not be read
Portugal Portugal 106 0% to 17% None: the publisher could not be read
Canada Canada 106 0% to 18% 1 quoted from source
Australia Australia 114 0% to 5% None: the publisher could not be read
European Union Spain, France, Italy, Netherlands 92 0% to 17% None: the publisher could not be read

3 of the 7 guides quote an invoice or marking rule from the destination's own publication. 4 record a rule they could not read, with the reason on the page. Between them the guides price 723 code and destination pairs, which are the same rows the code pages serve.

What these guides are not

They are not advice on how to structure a sale, and they do not tell you which delivery term to agree. DDP and DAP are contract terms published by the International Chamber of Commerce, not customs law, and each guide says what the choice does to the charges this site prices without quoting a definition it has not read. Nothing here is a customs ruling, and the classification of your goods remains yours to get right: that decision belongs on the code pages and the chapter notes beside them.

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