Exporting / the European Union
Exporting to European Union: what your buyer pays on arrival
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.
Every other page on this site answers the importer. This one answers the seller, from the same rows. The figures below are the ones a buyer in Spain, France, Italy and Netherlands meets on arrival, read from the tariff schedules this site holds, and a shipment priced here prices the same in the duty calculator because both go through one function.
What your buyer pays when it lands
Duty first, on the CIF value, then the consumption tax on the value plus the duty. Estimate uses the CIF customs valuation method, so international freight and insurance are part of the dutiable value.
The dearest thing a seller can put in front of Spain out of what this site prices is 640220, flip-flops and thong sandals, rubber or plastic, at 17%. On the duty free ones a seller quoting a landed price is quoting tax and carriage rather than tariff, which is a different conversation to have with a buyer. Between 850940 at 2.2% and 640220 at 17% there is enough difference to decide whether a DDP price is worth quoting at all. Averaged across the 5 codes this site prices in it, chapter 64 is the dearest chapter into Spain, at 12.4%.
The valuation rule is Union Customs Code (Reg. 952/2013) Art. 70 and Art. 71(1)(e): transport and insurance to the place of introduction are added to the price paid. This site reads the third country rate, which is what applies when no trade agreement is claimed, so a buyer who can claim one may pay less and never more.
These duty figures are derived, and that is a claim worth reading carefully
This site does not read those 4 national tariffs directly. It reads Germany and Portugal, both of which publish the Union's common customs tariff, and it serves a figure for the other member states only where those two agree. The duty is therefore as reliable as the agreement between two official publications, and a disagreement produces no figure at all rather than a guess. The consumption tax beside it is not derived: it is each member state's own standard rate, read from the Commission's database.
Who collects it
the national customs administration of the member state of entry, applying the Union Customs Code. The charge falls on the importer of record, which is whoever is named on the customs entry, and that is decided by the delivery term the two of you agreed rather than by the tariff. Which is why the section below matters more to a seller than the percentages above do.
Named here on the evidence of the valuation source cited above, which is a source this site already holds rather than a recollection. This site does not hold a primary source for the collection procedure itself and does not describe one.
The low value regime, and what it does to the rates above
Spain relieves nothing: the relief was abolished, so the duty above is charged whatever the consignment is worth. A smaller shipment pays less because the value is lower, not because a threshold spared it.
The source, in its own words
The EUR 150 consignment relief was abolished and replaced by a flat customs duty per item on low value distance sales.
Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 1 and Article 2. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2026/382/oj
One shipment, priced the way your buyer will see it
420211, suitcases and briefcases, leather outer, invoiced at EUR 2,000.00, priced in EUR because a threshold is set in the destination's currency and nothing here is converted.
| Goods value on your invoice | EUR 2,000.00 |
| International freight | EUR 120.00 |
| Cargo insurance | EUR 30.00 |
| Value the duty is charged on, CIF basis | EUR 2,150.00 |
| Duty at 3% | EUR 64.50 |
| Spain tax at 21%, charged on the value plus the duty | EUR 465.04 |
| What your buyer pays to take delivery, before commercial charges | EUR 2,679.54 |
The same shipment appears from the buyer's side on the 420211 page and in the duty calculator, priced by the same function. An illustration, not a quotation: broker fees, handling and any trade remedy on the origin sit outside it.
DDP or DAP, and why it decides who pays the figures above
Under DAP, delivered at place, you get the goods to the agreed place and your buyer is the importer of record. They clear the goods, they are named on the entry, and the duty and the tax in the table above are theirs to pay. The price you quoted is the price they pay you, and the border charge arrives afterwards as a separate bill, which is where a buyer who was not expecting it refuses the parcel.
Under DDP, delivered duty paid, you are the importer of record. You clear the goods into Spain, you pay the member state customs administration what the table above says, and your buyer pays only the price on your invoice. It is the better experience to buy from and it puts the whole of the landed figure on your side of the deal, so the number to quote from is the total in the table rather than the goods value.
The choice is not a customs decision and nobody at the border makes it for you. It is a term of your contract of sale, and the only thing customs takes from it is who is named on the entry.
DDP and DAP are Incoterms, which are rules published by the International Chamber of Commerce and incorporated into a contract by the parties. They are not customs law and this site does not quote the ICC text, which is not published free of charge. What is written above is the consequence for the charges this site does price, and nothing here should be read as the definition of either term.
What has to be on the invoice, and on the goods
What this site has not been able to read, and therefore does not state. An unsourced rule is worse than no rule, because it still looks like one.
- The commercial invoice: EUR-Lex, which publishes Union law, answers a request from a program rather than a browser with an empty response. That is true of the Combined Nomenclature regulation and of the Union Customs Code implementing regulation alike, so neither could be read here. The Union valuation rule is sourced from elsewhere and is stated above, at Union Customs Code Article 70 and 71(1)(e). The content of the commercial invoice is not.
- Marking the goods: Not reached, for the same reason. The Union has no general origin marking requirement for most goods, but this site has not read a primary source saying so and therefore does not say it.
Proving origin, from the seller's side
A preferential rate into the European Union is an entitlement rather than a discount, and it has to be proved: the member state customs administration accepts a document you or your buyer make out, and what that document has to contain is set by the agreement rather than by either of you.
- What has to sit behind it. Where a supplier regularly sends an exporter goods whose originating status is expected to be the same, one long-term declaration may cover the consignments that follow.
- How long one covers. That declaration runs for a validity period the regulation caps, and it may also be made out after the event to cover goods already delivered.
- What counts as proof. The form the declaration takes is set by the annexes to the regulation, and which annex applies turns on whether the goods already have preferential originating status.
Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447, Articles 62 and 63, Long-term supplier's declaration, and the making out of supplier's declarations, published by the Official Journal of the European Union, through EUR-Lex. Quoted below as published.
1. Where a supplier regularly supplies an exporter or trader with consignments of goods, and the originating status of the goods of all those consignments is expected to be the same, the supplier may provide a single declaration covering subsequent consignments of those goods (long-term supplier's declaration). A long-term supplier's declaration may be made out for a validity period of up to 2 years from the date on which it is made out.
2. A long-term supplier's declaration may be made out with retroactive effect for goods delivered before the making out of the declaration. Such a long-term supplier's declaration may be made out for a validity period of up to 1 year prior to the date on which the declaration was made out. The validity period shall end on the date on which the long term supplier's declaration was made out.
3. The supplier shall inform the exporter or trader concerned immediately where the long-term supplier's declaration is not valid in relation to some or all consignments of goods supplied and to be supplied.
1. For products having obtained preferential originating status, the supplier's declarations shall be made out as laid down in Annex 22-15. However, long-term suppliers' declarations for those products shall be made out as laid down in Annex 22-16.
2. For products which have undergone working or processing in the Union without having obtained preferential originating status, the supplier's declarations shall be made out as laid down in Annex 22-17. However, for long-term supplier's declarations, the supplier's declarations shall be made out as laid down in Annex 22-18.
3. The supplier's declaration shall bear a handwritten signature of the supplier. However, where both the supplier's declaration and the invoice are drawn up by electronic means, these can be electronically authenticated or the supplier can give the exporter or trader a written undertaking accepting complete responsibility for every supplier's declaration which identifies him as if it had been signed with his handwritten signature.
All 6 paragraph(s) the selector matched are above. The selector was every numbered provision the regulation prints between the heading Article 62 and the heading Article 64, carrying no figure of money and no dash. Read from https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32015R2447 on 2026-09-08. The whole document is at https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32015R2447.
Whether a product originates under a Union arrangement is decided by that arrangement's own product rules, which this site does not hold. What the rate is worth once you have proved it, and the tax and any low value relief sitting on top of it, are on the Spain guide; the terms are in the glossary and the wider question in the agreements FAQ.
One thing is true of every destination on this site and does not need a national source: the classification is yours to get right. The code you put on the invoice is what the duty above is charged under, and a code that is wrong is wrong in both directions, so a reader deciding one should be on the code page and the chapter note rather than on this page. Start at 420211 or in the full directory.