Customs and import glossary
The 20 terms this site uses when it tells you what something costs to import, defined in plain words and linked to the 32 pages where each one decides something.
18 of them are defined in the answer to a question in the FAQ, and this page quotes that answer rather than writing a second version of it, so the two can never drift apart. The other 2 are terms the FAQ uses and never stops to define, and their definitions live here and nowhere else.
- Ad valorem duty
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An ad valorem duty is one expressed as a percentage of the customs value, which is the form most duty takes and the only form a percentage can honestly describe.
No article on this site stops to define ad valorem duty, so this entry is its only home.
Where it decides something
- Autonomous suspension
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An autonomous suspension works differently from a quota: an authority temporarily waives duty on an input that domestic manufacturers cannot source locally, usually with a review date attached.
Defined in What is an MFN (Most Favoured Nation) duty rate?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- CIF value
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CIF stands for cost, insurance and freight. As a customs term it means the value your duty is calculated on includes what you paid for the goods plus what it cost to get them to the border of the importing country.
Defined in What is CIF value in customs?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Customs broker
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A customs broker files your declaration and deals with the authority on your behalf.
Defined in What does a customs broker do?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Customs declaration
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A declaration is filed against your goods with a classification, a customs value, an origin and a set of supporting documents.
Defined in How long does customs clearance take?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- United Arab Emirates import guide
- Australia import guide
- Brazil import guide
- Canada import guide
- China import guide
- Germany import guide
- Spain import guide
- France import guide
- United Kingdom import guide
- Japan import guide
- Portugal import guide
- Singapore import guide
- How long does customs clearance take?
- How do free trade agreements affect import duty?
- Why are my goods held at customs?
- How is import duty calculated?
- What is CIF value in customs?
- What does a customs broker do?
- What is an HS code?
- Customs value
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The customs value is the figure both the duty and the consumption tax are calculated from, and different countries build it differently.
Defined in How is import duty calculated?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- De minimis threshold
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A de minimis threshold is the value under which a consignment was let in without duty, on the reasoning that collecting a few cents costs more than it raises.
Defined in What is the de minimis threshold?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- FOB value
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Under a CIF basis, the international freight and the cargo insurance are inside the number customs multiplies by your duty rate. Under an FOB basis they are outside it, and only the price of the goods themselves is dutiable.
Defined in What is CIF value in customs?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Free trade agreement
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A free trade agreement lets goods that genuinely originate in one party enter the other at a reduced rate, often zero. It is a conditional entitlement rather than an automatic discount, and the condition is origin.
Defined in How do free trade agreements affect import duty?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Harmonized System
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The Harmonized System is maintained by the World Customs Organization and revised every five years or so.
Defined in What is an HS code?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- HS code
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An HS code is the number customs uses to decide what your product is.
Defined in What is an HS code?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- HTS code
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HS is the six-digit international standard. HTS is the United States extension of it, and every other market has an extension of its own with a different name and a different number of digits.
Defined in What is the difference between HS and HTS codes?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Import duty
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Duty is a percentage of the value customs puts on your goods. The percentage comes from your code and your destination.
Defined in How is import duty calculated?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Import VAT
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Import VAT is the same tax a domestic buyer pays on a domestic purchase, collected at the border instead of at the till.
Defined in Do I pay VAT on imported goods?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Landed cost
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Landed cost is what a unit actually costs you by the time it is sitting in your warehouse, ready to sell. It is the purchase price plus carriage, insurance, duty, tax and the handling charges nobody quotes at the start.
Defined in What is "landed cost" in importing?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- MFN rate
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The most favoured nation rate is the ordinary rate a country charges on a product from any other member of the World Trade Organization with which it has no special arrangement.
Defined in What is an MFN (Most Favoured Nation) duty rate?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Rules of origin
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Origin is not where the goods were shipped from. It is where they were produced or last substantially transformed, tested against rules written into the agreement itself, product by product.
Defined in How do free trade agreements affect import duty?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Australia import guide
- Canada import guide
- China import guide
- United Kingdom import guide
- United States import guide
- How long does customs clearance take?
- How do free trade agreements affect import duty?
- Why are my goods held at customs?
- How is import duty calculated?
- Do I pay VAT on imported goods?
- What does a customs broker do?
- What is "landed cost" in importing?
- What is an MFN (Most Favoured Nation) duty rate?
- What Chinese goods actually cost to import in 2026: the duty stack after IEEPA
- Specific duty
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Some tariff lines are specific rather than ad valorem: an amount per litre, per item or per kilogram, sometimes combined with a percentage and sometimes with a floor and a ceiling. There is no honest way to express those as a single percentage without knowing the weight or the volume.
Defined in What is an MFN (Most Favoured Nation) duty rate?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
- Tariff line
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A tariff line is one priced row of the national schedule a destination writes for itself, below the six digits this site answers at, and it is the level a duty is actually charged on.
No article on this site stops to define tariff line, so this entry is its only home.
Where it decides something
- Tariff quota
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A tariff quota lets a fixed quantity in at a reduced rate each period and reverts to the ordinary rate once the volume is exhausted, so the rate you get can depend on how early in the period your goods arrive.
Defined in What is an MFN (Most Favoured Nation) duty rate?, which is where the rest of the answer is.
Where it decides something
A glossary is a starting point and not an authority. Every figure on this site carries the source it was read from and the date it was read; a definition carries neither, because it is describing a word rather than stating a fact about a market. Where a term decides money, follow it to the page that prices it.