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US President Donald Trump has temporarily banned measures to close a tariff exemption for low -cost shipments from China while officials understand how to tax millions of packages reaching the US daily.
In a change of an executive order signed on Wednesday and published on Friday, the White House said the so-called devision de minimis excludes shipments below $ 800 in value from strict customs duties and controls will remain in place until they are “adequate systems in the country to fully process and with adaptation and collect tariff income”.
Trump had canceled the exemption in an executive order last week that imposed an additional 10 percent fee for goods from China, for which the White House said it was intended to punish Beijing for allowing the deadly Opioid Fentanile flow in the SH.BA The rest of the fees remains in force.
China retaliated a few days later, announcing 10 to 15 percent fees in liquid natural gas, coal, raw oil and farm equipment, which will take effect from Monday.
Trump said Tuesday he was in “no hurry” to talk to his Chinese counterpart.
The de minimis provision was created to help American households and small businesses buy low -cost items externally without making them subject to large customs controls. In recent years, it has proven help to the -Commerce platforms that send directly to consumers, such as Shein and Temu of China.
But if the analysts had warned that the measures to cancel the exemption, which came into force just days after being notified, would force customs officials to implement the most complicated official entry process on any package arriving from China.
Customs and US border protection estimate that it processes more than 4 million low -value shipments daily. A report by the Congress Committee in 2023 estimated that about 30 percent of those packages came from Temu and Shein.
The mass would also make parcels that once qualified for the Dev minimum entity not only with the additional 10 percent fee, but also for existing trade taxes, according to experts.
The US Postal Service on Tuesday suspended receiving packages from China, including Hong Kong, before retiring the day later to accept the deliveries. The USPS said it was working with customs officials to create an “efficient meeting mechanism”, as the rapid implementation of the Directive increased workloads for customs officials and narrow unrest for exporters and carriers.
Chinese E -Commerce sellers also said this week that some logistics groups were charging them by holding fees to cover taxes and other customs costs.
US officials have long regulated their rules in their images. Local retailers who buy abroad items have complained that the exemption gave Chinese e -commerce groups an unfair cost advantage.
Former US President Joe Biden’s administration had proposed measures to strengthen the rules regarding the De minimis regime.
A report by analysts in Nomura, the Japanese Investment Bank, estimated that China sent a pack of $ 46 billion to the SH.BA according to the rules of De Minimis in 2024, and that the removal of exceptions could knock 0.2 percentage points from Chinese economic growth in 2025 .
