The hidden costs of shipping from the UK to the EU

Ask a UK small business owner what it costs to ship to France, and most will say: "About £12 for a small parcel, £18 for a medium one." Then they'll be surprised when their French customer gets a bill from the courier for another €22 on delivery.

This guide explains the costs that most UK sellers aren't accounting for — and what they mean in practice.

The cost you know about: the courier charge

The courier charge is the most visible shipping cost. You pay it upfront, you see it on your invoice, and you typically pass some or all of it on to your customer.

For a small parcel from the UK to France, you might pay £10–15 with a budget courier. For Germany or Spain, perhaps £12–18. These are real costs, but they're only part of the picture once your parcel crosses the EU border.

The costs your customer pays: import duty

Since Brexit, parcels sent from the UK to the EU are treated as international imports. That means they go through customs clearance, and may attract import duty.

For consignments worth more than €150, import duty is charged as a percentage of the customs value — the goods plus transport and insurance costs. The rate depends on what the product is — specifically, its commodity code in the EU's Combined Nomenclature tariff schedule. A rough guide:

• Electronics and tech products: typically 0% under the WTO Information Technology Agreement, whatever the country of origin
• Books and printed materials: 0%
• Clothing and footwear: 0–12% depending on material
• Ceramics, glassware and pottery: 8–12%
• Furniture and homewares: 0–5.6%
• Food products: varies widely, 0–20%+

The good news: many products qualify for 0% duty under the UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement, because the UK and EU agreed tariff-free trade for goods that genuinely originate in the UK. If your product was made or substantially transformed in the UK, it may qualify. This is worth checking — a 0% duty rate is reassuring information to pass on to your EU customers.

New from 1 July 2026: the €3 flat fee on low-value parcels

For years, consignments worth €150 or less entered the EU duty-free. That ended on 1 July 2026. The EU abolished the low-value exemption and replaced it with a temporary flat customs duty of €3 per item on consignments up to €150, in place until 1 July 2028 (Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382). Most small parcels from the UK fall squarely inside this band, so this is a new cost on almost every order you send.

Two things to note. First, the flat fee is not collected through IOSS — the Import One-Stop Shop still handles VAT only, so the €3 is paid at the border by whoever declares the goods. Second, if your goods genuinely originate in the UK, you can still claim 0% duty under the Trade and Cooperation Agreement instead of paying the flat fee — but that means lodging a standard customs declaration, which for a small parcel is often more hassle than the €3 saved.

The costs your customer pays: import VAT

Whatever the duty comes to, your EU customer will almost certainly pay import VAT. This is charged at the VAT rate that applies to the goods — the standard rate for most products, though some categories such as books and food attract reduced rates (books in France are 5.5%, for example). The base is the CIF value — the cost of the goods plus insurance and freight — with any import duty added on top before the VAT is worked out.

Current standard VAT rates for the main EU markets the UK exports to:

• France: 20%
• Germany: 19%
• Netherlands: 21%
• Spain: 21%
• Italy: 22%
• Ireland: 23%
• Sweden: 25%

If your customer has bought an £80 product with £12 shipping, that's a £92 CIF value. Add the €3 flat duty (≈ £2.60) and the VAT base is £94.60. At 20% French VAT, that's £18.92 in import VAT — collected by the courier before delivery. This amount is in addition to everything they already paid you.

The cost nobody itemises: courier clearance fees

The most overlooked cost of all is the courier's own charge for handling customs. When a carrier clears your parcel through EU customs and advances the duty and VAT on your customer's behalf, they charge for the service — a customs clearance or disbursement fee, typically €5–15 per parcel, added to the bill your customer settles at the door. On a low-value order, that fee alone can be bigger than the duty it accompanies.

The full picture: a worked example

Let's say you're a UK ceramics seller shipping a handmade vase worth £65 to a customer in Germany.

Your customer thinks they're paying £65 + £14 = £79. They're actually paying £101.60. The £22.60 gap appears at the door, demanded by the courier before they hand over the parcel. Ceramics carry a duty rate of around 8%, but since July 2026 that only applies above the €150 threshold — below it, the €3 flat fee takes its place.

What to do with this information

You have three sensible options:

Option 1: Display the full landed cost at checkout. Show EU customers what they'll actually pay — including estimated duty and VAT — before they complete their purchase. For consignments up to €150, registering for the EU's Import One-Stop Shop (IOSS) is the standard way to collect the VAT at checkout, so the courier has no VAT to demand on delivery (the €3 flat fee is handled separately at the border). This sets the right expectation and eliminates complaints.

Option 2: Ship DDP (Delivered Duty Paid). Under DDP terms, you cover the duty and VAT yourself and build the cost into your selling price. The customer pays one price, nothing is collected at the door, and refusals and disputes drop dramatically. Many couriers offer DDP as a service option.

Option 3: Build it into your EU pricing. Charge EU customers a higher price that accounts for the expected duty and VAT, so your net margin is preserved and the customer still sees a single, final price at checkout.

All three approaches work. The worst option — and by far the most common — is to do nothing and let your customers discover the full cost when the courier knocks on the door.