The British Chambers of Commerce is offering guidance to companies affected by Donald Trump's decision to end a global tariff exemption used by shoppers of low-cost goods.
The order comes into force on 29 August and extends existing levies targeting cheap products from China and Hong Kong to now cover the rest of the world.
The de minimis exemption had allowed goods valued at $800 or less to enter the US without paying any tariffs.
Responding to President Trump’s decision to charge import duties for low value goods entering the US, William Bain, Head of Trade Policy at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: “This development has been coming for several months but is still a major blow to UK exporters to the US. Smaller firms and sole traders, who have invested strongly in e-commerce sales internationally, will be worst hit.
“But the UK is in a comparatively advantageous position in terms of these additional duties compared with those faced by other countries.
“The EU is also likely to scrap its de minimis threshold by 2028, and the UK government is launching a review into removing the threshold here too.
“There are still great opportunities, both in the US market and other markets globally for UK goods, but SMEs will need to rethink their sales and distribution plans to deal with these added duties.
“The Chamber Network in the UK, and internationally, can provide the best advice, alongside the logistics industry, to overcome these challenges and sustain export growth.
“Action on the government’s new trade strategy is now also more urgent. Exporters to the US, particularly SMEs and sole traders, will need additional support and advice to deal with the disruption and added costs these de minimis threshold changes will cause.”
Under the Executive Order issued by the President, duties will be payable on goods valued under $800 from August 29. These will be in line with the rates applied to other goods from each country in accordance with its tariff rates.
For most UK goods export sectors this means the tariff rate they used to have plus the additional 10% reciprocal rate applied to most UK goods since April.
Alternatively, for the first six months only, a specific rate of $80 per item would apply to low value packages from the UK entering the US. After that period the duties described above will be enforced on all packages of UK origin in scope.
More detail on the US changes to de minimis thresholds can be found here.