Europe imposes a two-euro rate on packages purchased outside the EU

Europe has begun today, 1 November, to introduce arateof two eurosper item for products purchased via the Internet outside the European Union (EU)  . This measure is in addition to the rate of three euros that hasbeen in force since July for purchases of less than 150 euros.

In contrast to the summer charge, which endedthe exemption from customs duties for low-value goods, this new fee is intended to offset the costs of national administrations for the processing and supervision of shipments, from the verification of declared data to, where appropriate, risk and physical inspections.

Thus, the measure responds to intense growth in e-commerce from third countries, with around 5.9 billion low-value items entering the EU last year, four times more than in 2022, about 90% of which came from China, according to Brusela data.

This growth has significantly increased the customs workload and made it difficult to detect products that violate European consumer safety and protection standards , and has also fuelled concern about competition from companies based in the EU to sellers outside the EU.

This new management fee, independent of the one in force since 1 July, willapply separately to the temporary rate of EUR 3, which applies to items imported into shipments whose value does not exceed EUR 150, once the EU has lifted the exemption allowing such purchases to be included without paying customs duties.

In the latter case, the amount is calculated on the basis of the category of the product and not of the whole package, so that a shipment containing several articles of the same customs classification may be subject to a single charge of three euros, and a shipment containing different goods may be subject to payment for each of them.

This temporary system will be maintained until July 2028, when the launch of the new European e-commerce customs data platform is planned to replace the fixed levy with the ordinary duties on each commodity.