This is probably a long shot, but just wondering whether anyone has any recent experience successfully receiving snus/nicotine pouches by mail from abroad? I made a couple of orders back in April/June (around 30 cans in total, total value ca. 3000 TWD), which took forever to make it to Taiwan owing to the current international mail situation.
A couple of weeks ago I had to go to the post office to collect the green card telling me that some of the envelopes had been confiscated and that I’d need to go to the customs office near Da’an Park to sort it out:
Does anyone know what I’m in for here when I go to the office? Is it just about telling them whether I want it to be destroyed or returned to sender, or can I be fined? Or is there a customs duty/tariff to be paid? Is there any room to discuss this and get the parcels released? Am I going to be led away in handcuffs?
I’ve tried to check online, but I’m not quite sure what tariff code these things fall under in Taiwan. I suspect it’s either 24039910 (“tobacco extracts and essences”, doesn’t appear to be restricted for import/export) or 24039990 (“other manufactured tobacco and manufactured tobacco substitutes”, import appears to be banned without a license). I’m not sure whether this makes a difference, but some of the cans are regular snus (so actual tobacco products) and some of them are nicotine pouches (which I believe are some plant/cellulose-type material impregnated with nicotine and flavorings, although this might then put them under the remit of the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act and the FDA like e-cigarettes, which I guess could be worse).
The notice you posted has a tick on the item saying “banned for import, please come and organize returning the items” with “destroying the items” crossed out. Next to that it says “individuals are banned from importing chewing tobacco”.
Thanks for your response. I’m probably being overly optimistic, but do you reckon it makes any difference that this isn’t actually chewing tobacco, or is the Chinese term sufficiently broad to include snus?
You can’t import tobacco products without special arrangement. Plus given the amount you imported that’s definitely way over the limit (as far as carrying it in from home). I think the limit is 2 cartons of cigarettes.
“30 cans” might sound like more than it is if you’re not familiar with snus. One can contains 20 small (< 1 gram) pouches, with a total tobacco weight of maybe 12-20 grams per can.
So the total amount (over my two separate orders) was probably on the order of 400-450 grams. It might be slightly over the 454 grams of tobacco one can carry on their person when entering as a passenger (which might not actually be relevant here for mailed items), but it’s not hugely over.
I wouldn’t be wholly against paying the taxes/duties on it (depending on how high they are), if that was actually an option. But it doesn’t seem to be.
I actually kind of already did - the company’s policy is that shipments by regular mail and customs issues are at the customer’s own risk (which is fair enough), but they refunded me in this particular case as an exception because delivery was taking so long. Plus it’s kind of a perishable product, so they can’t really restock it and sell it again after 2-4 months in transit. The best that they can usually do is resend it for free and hope it gets through (which I’ve done once before, but not to Taiwan). But it’s not really about the money here, I’d just prefer to actually have the snus and re-refund the company.
As an aside, just for my own edification regarding Taiwanese customs policies, if some hypothetical person, who categorically isn’t me, were to later be sent another order of something that had previously been confiscated by customs, would this then perhaps become a bigger issue? Just out of curiosity. (As in, for example, do they keep records of confiscated parcels belonging to each person?)
200 pieces of cigarettes, 25 pieces of cigars or a pound of tobacco; however such privilege is limited to adult passengers, ages 20 and above.
Maximum with duty
(1)捲菸5條(1,000支)，或
(2)雪茄125支，或
(3)菸絲5磅。
Article 45 of the first law says
when an inward passenger carries tobacco or alcohol products in excess of duty-free quantities and fails to declare the products to Customs, the excess quantities shall be forfeited to Customs, and Customs shall impose on the passenger a respective administrative fine of not less than NT$500 and not more than NT$5,000 for each ream of cigarettes, pound of cut tobacco, twenty-five cigars, or liter of alcohol, and in such case the penalties imposed under the Customs Anti-Smuggling Act shall not apply.
