EUR 3 customs duty: per item, not per parcel

Regulation (EU) 2026/382 applies a customs duty of EUR 3 per item to goods sold in distance sales, in consignments with an intrinsic value of EUR 150 or less, whichever VAT scheme is used. It runs from 1 July 2026 to 1 July 2028. The unit is the item, not the parcel.

Suppose a cosmetics brand modelled the reform at EUR 3 a parcel. Its typical order is a serum, a cleanser and a cloth pouch, so it budgeted one charge per order. Two months after the duty started applying, its declarations come back at EUR 9. Nothing has gone wrong at the border. The brand read the unit incorrectly.

What the statute says, in its own words

The wording matters, so here it is. Article 2 of Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382 of 11 February 2026 provides that “a customs duty of EUR 3 per item in a consignment the intrinsic value of which does not exceed a total of EUR 150 shall apply instead of the relief eliminated pursuant to Article 1 of this Regulation”.

Two words in that sentence carry the whole article. The unit is per item, not per parcel. And the charge applies “instead of the relief eliminated pursuant to Article 1”, because Article 1 deleted Chapter V of Title II of Regulation (EC) No 1186/2009, the duty relief that had let consignments of EUR 150 or less enter free of customs duty. The relief is gone for everybody. What replaced it is not the same thing for everybody.

Note the threshold as written: intrinsic value of EUR 150 or less. Intrinsic value, defined in Article 1(48) of the Union Customs Code Delegated Act, Regulation (EU) 2015/2446, is the price of the goods themselves, excluding transport and insurance costs unless those are included in the price and not separately indicated on the invoice.

What counts as an item?

The term item, defined in Article 1(61) of the same Delegated Act, means one or more goods in a consignment sharing the same tariff classification, description and origin. Quantity is irrelevant. Five identical units of one classification are one item. Two units of two different classifications are two items.

DG TAXUD publishes the arithmetic directly. Five T-shirts in one parcel attract EUR 3, because they are one item. One T-shirt plus one watch attracts EUR 6, because they are two. That pair is worth remembering, because it removes the per-parcel misreading in a single line.

The guidance then applies the statute mechanically. Its words are that the duty “will automatically apply per declaration line irrespective of the quantity (number of the articles) in that declaration line”. That is the Commission’s application of the statute, not its wording. It resolves to the same number, because a declaration line groups goods of one tariff classification. The guidance also closes the obvious workaround: under the amended Article 228(1) of the Union Customs Code Implementing Act, grouping items under a single highest rate is not allowed where the EUR 3 duty applies.

For the cosmetics brand, that is the answer. A serum, a cleanser and a pouch sit under three different classifications, so the order is three items and pays three times.

Which shipments does the duty cover?

Article 2 attaches two conditions. The duty applies where the importation is exempt from VAT under Article 143(1), point (ca), of Directive 2006/112/EC, which is the Import One Stop Shop, or where the goods are in a postal consignment as defined in Article 1, point (24), of Regulation (EU) 2015/2446.

That looks narrow until you read the amended postal definition, which the guidance sets out at section 3.3.2. It covers consignments of EUR 150 or less sold in distance sales, excluding those exempt under Article 143(1)(ca), and expressly refers to goods where VAT is collected under the special arrangements model or the standard VAT scheme. The two limbs of Article 2 therefore meet rather than leave a gap, and the Commission states the intention plainly: the duty applies to distance sales up to EUR 150 regardless of the VAT scheme used, whether IOSS, special arrangements or standard VAT, and whether the goods are declared on an H1, H6 or H7 dataset.

The guidance keeps one carve-out, and it sits outside IOSS. Goods that benefit from preferential measures, a reduced or zero rate under a trade agreement or a customs union agreement, are excluded from the amended postal definition. Where the VAT has not been collected through IOSS, they are declared on an H1 with the preference code, and the preferential rate applies instead of the EUR 3. Where IOSS has been used, the guidance is explicit that all goods pay the EUR 3, whatever dataset they are declared on.

So IOSS does not remove the duty. It determines which limb of Article 2 you land under and which customs office is competent, not whether you pay. Where IOSS is used, the declaration may be lodged in any member state. Where it is not, the competent office is in the member state of destination.

One boundary is worth stating because the statute draws it: the EUR 3 replaces the deleted relief for goods sold in distance sales. Goods that are not sold in a distance sale are outside that mechanism and follow the ordinary customs treatment for their classification and value under the Common Customs Tariff.

The same DG TAXUD guidance also introduces the Product Identifier for distance sales, covered in the Product Identifier customs will ask for.

How this runs at EFC

The duty is a charge on a route, not on a product, so the answer is structural. At EFC’s base in Portugal, run with Warelog, stock lands once at wholesale level. It is usually released for free circulation on arrival; higher-value goods that move in smaller volumes can instead be held under the customs warehousing procedure in Article 240 of the Union Customs Code, Regulation (EU) No 952/2013. An order that ships from stock already inside the EU is not an import of a low-value consignment from a third country, so the EUR 3 mechanism has nothing to attach to. It is a domestic European delivery, as selling to 27 EU markets from one import explains.

What that requires in practice is an importer of record named once at intake rather than improvised parcel by parcel, and a fulfilment line that picks and dispatches from the same floor that filed the declaration. VAT on the sales themselves is unaffected and still owed in each buyer’s country, reported through the One Stop Shop or a local registration.

What a customs warehouse does not change

It does not delete the duty. A bonded warehouse suspends duty and import VAT while goods sit under customs supervision, and both fall due at each release for free circulation, each release its own tax point. Deferral, never exemption.

Nor is it a way to sell into the EU while goods remain under bond. The guidance is explicit at section 3.2.2: authorisations for customs warehousing are, in principle, granted on condition that the facility is not used for retail sale, and a supplier wishing to supply consumers with goods stored in a customs warehouse “must first declare the goods for free circulation in the EU”. That is a scope boundary on what a customs warehouse is for, not a loophole. The guidance also notes that goods sold to consumers before storage in a customs warehouse are treated as dispatched from a third country, so the EUR 3 duty does apply to them.

And the end date is not a cliff edge in the brand’s favour. The duty applies until 1 July 2028, after which, in the guidance’s words, goods sold in transactions qualifying as distance sales “irrespective of their value, will be subject to the normal duty rate”. The flat charge is expected to be replaced by standard customs duties calculated through the new EU Customs Data Hub. Article 3 also obliges the Commission to assess by 1 October 2026 whether trade flows are being diverted, and by 1 December 2027 whether the Data Hub will realistically be operational, with a possible extension of the temporary duty if it is not.

The charge, and the alternative to paying it parcel by parcel, are walked through end to end on the 2026 reform page.

Sources

Claim	Figure	Source
Duty rate	EUR 3 per item	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 2, EUR-Lex, 11 February 2026
Value ceiling	intrinsic value of EUR 150 or less	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 2, 2026
Scope conditions	IOSS-exempt imports, Article 143(1)(ca), or postal consignments, Article 1(24) UCC-DA	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 2, points (a) and (b), 2026
Preferential goods outside IOSS	excluded from the amended postal definition; declared on an H1 with preference code 2, 3 or 4 instead of code 5, provided IOSS has not been used	DG TAXUD, Customs Guidance on the EUR 3 customs duty, version of 2 June 2026, sections 3.3.2 and 3.3.3
Application across VAT schemes	IOSS, special arrangements or standard VAT	DG TAXUD, Customs Guidance on the EUR 3 customs duty, version of 2 June 2026, sections 3.2 and 3.3.2
Worked example, five T-shirts	EUR 3, one item	European Commission, guidance and legal text on the temporary flat fee, 8 June 2026
Worked example, one T-shirt plus one watch	EUR 6, two items	European Commission, same page, 8 June 2026
Unit of application in practice	per declaration line, irrespective of quantity	Access2Markets notice, 2026, and DG TAXUD guidance section 3.3.1
Grouping under Article 228(1) UCC-IA	not allowed where the EUR 3 applies	DG TAXUD guidance, section 3.3.1, 2 June 2026
Period of application	1 July 2026 to 1 July 2028	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 2, 2026
Commission review of trade diversion	by 1 October 2026	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 3, via DG TAXUD guidance section 2.1
Commission review of Customs Data Hub readiness	by 1 December 2027	Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382, Article 3, via DG TAXUD guidance section 2.1
Goods in customs warehouses	authorisations in principle granted on condition that the facilities are not used for retail sale (Article 201 UCC-DA); a supplier wishing to supply consumers with goods stored in a customs warehouse must first declare them for free circulation; goods sold to consumers before storage are treated as dispatched from third countries, so the EUR 3 applies	DG TAXUD, Customs Guidance on the EUR 3 customs duty, version of 2 June 2026, section 3.2.2, opened 2026-09-03
After 1 July 2028	goods sold in transactions qualifying as distance sales, irrespective of their value, will be subject to the normal duty rate	DG TAXUD, Customs Guidance on the EUR 3 customs duty, version of 2 June 2026, section 3.1, opened 2026-09-03

Commercial summary, not legal or customs advice. Exact treatment depends on product, tariff classification, destination and sales structure.