What is a Duty Calculator?
A duty calculator is a tool used to get the cost of importing an item. In The Bahamas, a duty calculator will include all customs fees such as Duty, VAT, Processing Fee, and Environmental Levy Fee if applicable.
Calculating Duty In The Bahamas
Calculating the duty specifically for an item is straight-forward. You take the value of the item and multiply it by the duty rate. For example, if you’re importing a TV valued at $500. Using the current duty rate for TVs of 35%, the duty would be $500 x 35% which equals $175.
In The Bahamas, when we want to calculate the customs duty for an item, it’s usually the entire amount we expect to pay customs that we’re interested in. With the introduction of VAT and other fees such as environmental levy and processing fees, calculating customs can be complicated.
To explain how to calculate customs duty including all the other fees involved, I’ll use a cell phone as an example. The duty rate for cell phones is currently 10%. The VAT rate is currently 10%, processing fee is 1% with a minimum of $10 and a maximum of $500 and the environmental levy for cell phones is $5.00. I’ll use a cell phone value of $300.
First we’ll calculate the duty specifically. That will be $300 x 10% which gives us $30. Then we’ll calculate the processing fee which is $300 x 1% giving us $3. Since the minimum processing fee is $10, we’ll use that instead. So far the total we expect to pay is $40.
The environmental levy is straight-forward to include. We’ll just add $5 to $40 giving us $45. Finally we’ll calculate VAT. VAT is based on what is described as the landed cost. The landed cost includes all the fees we previously calculated in addition to the value of the item. So to calculate VAT we must add $300 - value of cell phone, $30 - duty, $10 - processing fee, and $5 - environmental levy fee giving us $345 as the landed cost. We then multiply that by 10% giving us VAT of $34.50.
Lastly we add everything together to get the cost we will have to pay customs for the import. I’ll use a table to make it easier to read.
Duty Calculation Breakdown
| Duty | $30 |
| Processing Fee | $10 |
| Environmental Levy | $5 |
| VAT | $34.50 |
| Total | $79.50 |
Duty Calculator Options Explained
Price
This is the price or value of the item you are purchasing. If you are buying more than one of the same item enter the base price and the amount as the quantity. Putting the total as the price for multiple items will work out the same.
Quantity
The number of items with each item being the cost of the amount you enter as the price.
Duty Rate
The duty rate is the percentage that should be used for the item. You can find duty rates for items on the duty rates page.
Other Fees
This includes any other fee you want to be included in the calculation such as environmental levy and storage fees.
1% As Minimum Processing Fee
This option allows you to override the default method that the customs department uses to determine the processing fee. According to their 2019 frequently imported items brochure. The processing fee for any import is 1% with a minimum of $10 and a maximum of $500. When you select 1% as the minimum processing fee, the calculator ignores the department of customs’s method and calculates everything at 1%.
Related Article: How To Calculate Customs Duty and Shipping - Bahamas