Duty questions, answered in the order people ask them

Duty, and where it gets calculated

The first question people ask about import charges is what the word covers, and the answer sets up everything after it. What most people call duty is two separate charges that arrive on one invoice: a duty assessed on the type of goods, and a turnover tax assessed on the value. The two use the same base and completely different rules, which is why an item can be duty-free and still produce a bill.

Where is the charge calculated? At the destination, on a value that includes what you paid for the goods and what you paid to move them. Follow-up, because people ask it straight away: does postage really join that value? On the rows the desk records, yes, and it is the single convention that changes the most outcomes. A parcel whose goods value sits comfortably under a gate can cross it once postage is added, and the crossing is what generates the notice.

The table below shows the same goods value against four different postage figures. Nothing about the goods changes between the rows, and the assessed outcome changes twice. This is the arithmetic that makes the first question worth answering properly rather than skipping to rates.

The two gates that decide an assessment

What decides whether a parcel is assessed at all? Two gates in the destination rules: one for duty and one for the turnover tax. Where the gates differ, the duty columns can be irrelevant while the tax columns still produce a line, which is the case in Australia and Singapore on the desk bands.

Is there a value below which nothing happens? Sometimes, and less often than people assume. Six of the eight destinations the desk tracks have a genuine low-value relief, and two of them set the relief so low that almost every parcel is assessed. What decides which side of a gate you land on is the landed value, not the goods value alone.

Rates, categories and the words on the invoice

How is the rate chosen? By what the goods are, not by what they cost. The desk records apparel duty as a band rather than a figure because the same jumper can be assessed at different rates depending on fibre and construction, and footwear bands run wider still. Follow-up: does the declared description change the rate? It can, because the description is what the assessment starts from. A line that names a material and a garment type gives the officer something to work with; a line that repeats a model code does not.

What about the value itself: can it be too low? A declared value that is defensible against the order record is the aim, and a value that looks inconsistent with the contents invites a second look. Nothing in the desk notes suggests that a low declaration is a route to a lower assessment in any useful sense; it is a route to a query.

Who collects the money and who pays it

Who actually bills you? On postal-style movements the charge usually reaches you as a notice before delivery, and on courier-style movements the carrier often advances the amount and invoices afterwards. Follow-up: how long do you have? The clock starts when the notice is issued, not when you read it, so the practical deadline is the one printed on the notice.

Are you the one who owes it? Yes, in the ordinary case. The receiver of the goods is the person the assessment is addressed to, which is why the tax or identification number matters: on destinations that ask for one, supplying it before departure keeps the assessment addressing the right party.

Queries, documentation and what to keep

What should you keep, and for how long? The order record, the invoice that was declared, the payment record, and any clearance correspondence, kept together and kept past the point where you would normally stop caring. A query can arrive weeks after delivery, and the answer is usually a document you already had. Follow-up: in what form? A single folder holding one order number beats four screenshots in three apps, because the person answering the query is comparing dates.

The list below is the set the desk treats as sufficient for a query, ordered by how often each item turns out to be the missing one. It is short on purpose. Longer evidence bundles make a claim slower to read, and a slower claim is a claim that ages.

1. The order record showing what you paid, with a date on it.
2. The declared invoice as it was transmitted, not as you typed it into a note.
3. The payment record that matches the order record, so the value is corroborated rather than asserted.
4. The clearance notice or courier invoice, including its issue date.
5. Any correspondence with the warehouse or the seller about substitutions, because a swapped item changes the description.

Disagreeing with a figure, and correcting one

What if you disagree with the figure? The productive path is arithmetic rather than argument: the band, the landed value and the rate that was applied. Knowing which of the three you are contesting is what makes a message answerable. A message that says the charge is wrong invites a restatement; a message that says the rate applied to this description is outside the band for this category invites a check.

Follow-up: what if the value on the declaration is wrong? Correct it rather than defending it. A corrected declaration is a routine event that happens when a substitution or a partial refund changes the true value. An inconsistent one is a query with a name attached, and it arrives at the least convenient moment, which is after the parcel has been delivered and the order has been closed.

How long does a disagreement take to resolve? Longer than the parcel took to arrive, in the ordinary case, because it runs alongside the collection clock rather than pausing it. That is the argument for getting the declaration right the first time rather than treating it as a draft.

Destinations, brokerage and the charges nobody expects

Does the destination change the answer? Everything except the goods changes: the gates, the rate bands, the currency, and whether the turnover tax is set nationally. On the desk bands, the turnover tax is national in five of eight destinations and set below national level in three, which is why a parcel to one address can be assessed differently from the same parcel to another.

What is a brokerage charge, and is it part of the duty? It is a handling charge for processing the entry, billed by the carrier rather than by customs, and on courier movements it is often the larger of the two lines. Follow-up: can it be avoided? Choosing a movement style that does not use a brokerage step is the only reliable way, and that is a line decision rather than a declaration decision.

The order these questions arrive in

Read end to end, the questions form a single funnel. First the vocabulary, then the gates, then the rate, then the party who pays, then the evidence, then the destination. Almost every confused message about import charges is a late question asked as if it were an early one, such as a rate question when the parcel never reached the rate because it never crossed the gate.

The desk keeps one shortcut for this: before asking anything about rates, compute the landed value and compare it with both gates for the destination. If the value is below both, no rate question applies and the useful question is why a charge appeared at all. If the value is above the duty gate but below nothing else, the rate question is the right one and the band is the table to open.

1. Vocabulary first: duty and turnover tax are separate charges on a shared base.
2. Gates second: two numbers per destination, and the tax gate is often the binding one.
3. Rate third, and only if the value crossed the first gate.
4. Evidence fourth: the order record and the declared invoice, kept together.
5. Destination last, because it changes every number except the goods.

The data point behind this note

Answer order derived from the desk duty bands in KB-2026-09 (eight destinations, gates and rate bands re-checked 2026-09-18, duty and tax gates recorded as separate fields for the first time in this batch).

◇KB-2026-09· 2026-09-30 Batch ledger · Challenge a figure

Notes in the same cluster

Related entries and gauges

• What joins the declared value, and what does not?
• Border cost bench

  Duty and tax assessed on the landed value, as a band.