Import Tax

[Degvr56]

Anyone familiar with the import rules and rates? Got a package send from Warszawa (PL) with clothes. The clothes are our belongings and used before. They were send by family. Value new: appr. 1400 Euro (insurance worth).

UPS Casablanca stated that Moroccan Customs requires an import tax of 9000 DH.
We are not staying in Morocco and need the stuff for our RTW trip towards SA, so it should be regarded as temporarily import and VAT is already payed in our homeland;
Tips on solving this issue?

[Tim Cullis]

VAT is a European tax and nothing to do with Morocco. This is an import tax based presumably on the high valuation placed on the package. The problem is how can the authorities know for certain you will export the goods?

You could have a browse of the Moroccan Customs website. Google for 'douane maroc' and click on 'translate this page' to get an English translation.

I have had email conversations in the past with the customs, so you could explore this as an option.

[Degvr56]

Tnx, Tim. I'll have a lookl at it.

How can the authorities know for sure, when you have the clothes with you whilst entering the country, that everything you got with you won't be sold.
They don't and you can still import without importtax.

I agree that the valuation is probably the reason.

The question is: how to convince them that we need our winterclothes for personal use? Most of them can be documented by earlier purchase vouchers. (digital available).

[Tim Cullis]

The argument you put forward is good. And as long as the clothes are used rather than new, it substantiates this. All you can do is try.

[Degvr56]

Problem solved. Went to Casablanca to sort it out with customs ourselves. Took us more than half a day and payed 196 MAD importtax for the 2 Maglite Mini PRO .
The clothing was free of charges at the end, after talking to at least four officers and two chefs.
UPS was a pain in the ass!
They wanted us to paf for the storage in the warehouse and stated that they could have solved the problems with customs as being professional.
Apparantly he forgot that he has send us a mail to come to Casablanca and pay 9600 MAD !!!

Lesson to be learned: don,t indicate the value of the package on the oputside, because they will use this as an amount to calculate the dutytax.

Lesson 2 : " service " UPS: sucks
Karima Afsahi
NOT Responsable Service Import: refuses to answeer properly our email and even the telephone calls from our Moroccon friend in both French and Moroccan. Phonecalls were put in hold for more than &à minutes and NO ANSWERS.

Latest NEW info: 2 weeks after we picked up the package in Casablanca the tracking and trace system of UPS stated: Receiver refused the delivery!!!