Customs value

What it means

Customs value is the base on which import duty is assessed. The rate follows the classification and the origin of the goods, but the amount payable follows the value: the primary method is the transaction value, the price actually paid or payable for goods sold for export to the Union.

It is not simply the invoice total. Transport and insurance up to the point of entry into the Union are added, along with royalties tied to the goods and commissions other than buying commission, while transport after entry and the import charges themselves come out.

Customs value is not the same as the acquisition cost in the books. Acquisition cost includes freight all the way to the warehouse, the duty and other incidental costs, whereas customs value stops at the Union border and excludes duty. Both come from the same invoice but serve different purposes, and one cannot simply be copied from the other.

How it works in practice

Under Incoterms such as EXW or FCA the buyer pays freight separately and has to add it to the value, while under DAP or DDP it is already in the price and the leg inside the Union comes back out. The freight document therefore belongs in the customs file.

Where the transaction value cannot be used, for instance between related parties whose relationship influenced the price, the fallback methods apply in a fixed order. The customs value also feeds the base for import VAT, increased by the duty and other costs.

If a Slovak company supplies a producer outside the EU with its own moulds, tools or material for production, their value is added to the price of the goods even though it is not on the supplier invoice. We quantify such items with the client from the accounting records so that the customs representative can state them correctly in the declaration.

What to watch out for

On an EXW purchase only the invoice amount is declared and the freight to the Union border is left out. A post-clearance check reassesses the value with interest: a VAT payer deducts the import VAT, but the duty and the penalty stay a pure cost.

Payments made after import, such as royalties tied to the resale of the imported goods or later price top-ups, can raise the customs value retrospectively. If the company books them only in its accounts and never tells customs, an audit recalculates the customs debt and it is paid with interest.