August 28, 2025
Stop! Before you order anything you need to figure out where it’s coming from. Because starting tomorrow – the price to get that import to you is going up or you may not get it at all – because your order may be canceled.
Starting tomorrow President Trump’s plan to fully remove the de minimis exemption for all imports takes effect. And because of that and because of the confusion around the policy — some European and Asian postal agencies have started to pause or cut off shipments to the United States altogether.
So – here’s what’s going on. I reported back in April that President Trump signed an executive order to eliminate the de minimis exemption. That exemption that has been around in some form since the 1930s – most recently the law says imports that have a value of less than $800 can be exempt from certain duties, fees, taxes and tariffs. Why? Well – the logic is —if customs and border protection is having to go through your silly little $50 Shein order trying to collect a tariff on that — they’re taking time and resources away from monitoring what’s coming in to the United States in those huge cargo ship containers. So for the last decade the us government has said if the value of the imported package is less than $800 bucks it’s just not worth our time — just let it go to the person who imported it. And we all know because of that de minimis exemption lots of small businesses and every day Americans have been able to benefit by getting cheaper products from overseas.
The president removed the de minimis exemption from imports coming from China and Hong Kong back in May. And by June – customs and border protection was adding a tariff of either 120% of the declared value of those imports, or a flat fee of $200 per item. Well – as of tomorrow, that’s extending to all imports from all countries. Those imports will no longer get the benefit of a de minims exemption. They will all face charges that range from 10% to 50% of the items’ declared value or, for the next six months, a flat fee of between $80 and $200 per parcel.
According to Post Europ – its members including France and Greece say because of this — shipments to the us are going to be disrupted. Mexico, Japan, Australia, Taiwan, Thailand, India and South Korea have temporarily suspended shipments to the United States because of this. And if you’ve ordered anything from Etsy or eBay – you may see a cancellation notice or a significant delay for your order because of the confusion over this de minimis policy.
Look – as I have reported repeatedly, tariffs are paid for in the end by you and American small businesses. Now that the de minimis exemption is gone for all imports of all countries– that import fee will be paid for by the company that you are ordering it from. It will be up to that company whether that fee will be passed down to you or if they’re going to eat the cost and cut into their own profit. Some of the bigger American corporations can eat some of these fees but lots of them have already announced they won’t do that for much longer. And when it comes to small businesses – it’s not as easy for mom and pop shops with extremely thin margins to eat these costs and they must pass it on to you.
The last thing you need to understand – now that the de minimis exemption is gone it doesn’t just apply to fully completed items – it applies to everything that is imported from every country– including parts and components that American businesses and manufacturers import and then use to create other completed items that you buy. So this trump policy is going to have wide reaching impact on all of us – even if we don’t buy items from foreign countries.
Read President Trump’s executive order here.
Read more from PostEurop here.
Read more from Customs and Border Protection here and here.
Read more from Etsy about this policy change here.
