There used to be a form back in the day. You’d take your camera gear (or whatever) to a window in the airport where they’d enter the information (including serial number) onto a small form that you’d hold in case you were challenged at customs. I did that once, back in the 80s. Never worried about it since.
Not sure there is such a form now.
ETA: Form still exists.
If they think it’s being imported without being declared, it’s on you to prove you either purchased it locally or previously imported it. Many years ago I bought my wife earrings in the Diamond District in NYC. We declared them coming back to Canada and paid the appropriate duty which IIRC was about 25%. She’s probably crossed the border between 50-100 times since and has never been stopped.
I bought myself a Rolex Submariner watch when I was younger (as a newly commissioned submarine officer with more income than good financial sense).
A couple of years later I flew to Europe wearing the watch and was questioned about it by a U.S. customs officer upon my return. I told him I had purchased it in the U.S. several years previously. He then wanted to know all kinds of specific details, including the approximate date I bought the watch, where I bought it, how much I paid, etc. I had ready, truthful answers for all of these questions, and this apparently satisfied him.
I know this is a hypothetical question and one can come up with an infinite number of permutations, but what about personal property that was originally made overseas. Suppose that 10 years ago I purchase a widget at a store here in the US for $1000. At the time, the widget was imported duty free. In today’s world widgets imported into the US have a duty applied to them, but I bought mine before the tariffs were imposed. Today I travel overseas and attempt to return with my widget in my luggage. What happens? The customs officer asks if I have anything to declare. What do I tell him? Because I originally bought the widget in the US, does that mean I don’t have to pay tariffs? Even though no tariffs were ever paid? Do I have to be prepared to prove I had purchased the item in the US?
It doesn’t matter what tariffs have been paid, if you already owned it when you left the country, you don’t owe tariffs bringing it back. But…the burden of proof is on you.
You didn’t buy your widget during the trip from which you are now returning. You don’t need to declare it, any more than you’d need to declare a watch that you bought during an overseas trip five years ago – you had to declare that watch then, but not now.
Tariffs and duties apply when an item is initially imported to the U.S., and are subject to whatever the law is when that initial importation occurs.
That makes sense. I was overthinking it. But I had better keep receipts.
My mom used to leave expensive jewelry at home when she left the country. No one is going to question the stained tee shirt you are wearing.
My friend recently paid the UPS driver a tariff for something he ordered from the Netherlands. He thought it was a scam at first, but the driver explained and showed him the invoice. I guess the drivers are all frustrated because now they have to ring doorbells and collect payment, but they still have their same routes.
I guess my friend could have paid UPS online and saved an additional fee.
That’s my experience. I’ve ordered many things from an American shipper who ships via UPS. Even though I’ve paid for the item and shipping up front when I have visited the business in the US, I always ask them to ship, and the packages always arrive at my home in Canada from UPS with an invoice indicating taxes and duties. The UPS driver can take my Visa card, runs it through his card machine, I pay the amount indicated on the invoice, and that’s that. I get my package, UPS gets what it fronted me, we’re all happy.
I find it hard to believe that Americans have never encountered this before. Really? You’ve never paid taxes and duty on imported goods? Hell, here in Canada, we’ve had to do that for decades.
It’s that $800 “de minimus” rule they had. I don’t think I’ve every ordered more than $800 worth of stuff at one time, so I expect a lot of people just never went over that limit. So, yeah, this is all new for a lot of people.
I posted this earlier, but I’ve had the Japan Post Office collect tariff in cash when they knocked on the door.
They didn’t have my contact information so that was the best way of getting ahold of me.
The advantage of collecting it at the door is the shipping company or post office ensures they get paid.
I don’t tend to order things for my own use from overseas because of the cost of shipping. When I was working in importing, we mostly used FedEx for airfreight. In that case, we had an account with them so any duties, taxes, etc. were billed to us.
At that time, (90s to early 2010s) it was all really straightforward and we didn’t have much of a hassle about questions of which categories the products fell in, so it was easy to decide tax rates.
UPS, FedEx, DHL, etc. are their own customs brokers so it’s straightforward. Ocean shipping is more complicated, but end users generally aren’t buying whole containers of things.
When we moved from Japan to Taiwan and then came back, we used a shipping company to ship most of our products by ocean.
On the move from Taiwan back to Japan, they had us write what was in each box and the value. Almost all the stuff was used and didn’t have much resale value. We paid a couple hundred dollars in taxes. We had to pay more when we moved to Taiwan, but I don’t remember the details.
I suspect that taking pictures of things before you go overseas would go a long ways establishing the fact you’ve owned to item from before going overseas.
Right. I’ve ordered lots of stuff from overseas, but I’ve never ordered an item that cost more than $800, so I’ve never paid duty. I just got a sticker that said the duty was zero.
Yup, this. I’ve regularly bought things stuff from companies in England and Canada (mostly model train stuff), but my orders have not ever been more than US$200, so until now, I’ve not ever run into having to pay a duty on any of it.
It’s absolutely true that Americans are confused about how to do something that many other countries have been doing for decades but it’s also true that most people in the US have never encountered it before , and there’s no guarantee that it will work in the US the same as it does anywhere else.
And anyway, doesn’t “American exceptionalism” refer to something more than simply the fact that the US does something differently than other countries?
And in the latest news, maybe you won’t have to even worry about this any time soon…
As at Aug 29, President Donald Trump is ending the so-called de minimis exemption that has applied to more than four million parcels processed by US Customs and Border Protection each day.
In response, a growing number of national mail services plan to temporarily suspend service to the US as soon as this week, citing a lack of clarity from American authorities on how the duties will be collected and how to submit required data.
That’s why you scuff up your new shoes and get them dirty before crossing the border. 
I used to get a “green card” for my camera from Canada customs before going abroad. Haven’t worried in decades. After all, everyone is carrying at minimum a smartphone, some worth up to $1800.
When I bought our wedding rings (Tiffany’s on 5th Ave.) I declared them coming back, just to be honest. I expected to pay the 15% luxury duty. The customs lady asked “What esle did you buy?” and we told her a bunch of tee shirts. She put down “clothing” for duty category on our declaration form, charged us $15 or so in duty.
I did the same. Easy to get and free of charge, and no questions about where you bought that camera on your return. Pull out that green card, and you’re fine. In my case, I also had another camera and my not-cheap-but-moderately-expensive flute on it, as I may have been travelling, but I still had to practice music daily. That green card saved me a lot of explanation regarding my cameras and my flute on my return.
There must be something similar for Americans. Worth looking into, anyway.
Already mentioned:
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ETA: Form still exists.
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