Türkiye abolishes simplified customs declaration for low-value e-commerce imports (Presidential Decree No. 10813)

Mechanism

Türkiye had already tightened its cross-border e-commerce de minimis regime in stages — cutting the duty-free/simplified threshold from EUR 150 to EUR 30 and then folding freight cost into that EUR 30 cap. Decree 10813 removes the simplified-declaration mechanism entirely: every parcel entering by post or express courier, at any value, must now go through the standard customs declaration and pay the ordinary ad valorem tariff for its HS classification, rather than the flat maktu (lump-sum) rate that applied under the simplified procedure. This lands one week before the broader 2026 import-tariff restructuring (Decree 10790, effective 1 January 2026) took full effect across non-EU goods, and follows the same policy direction: raising the effective cost of imported consumer goods, with cross-border e-commerce platforms (Temu, Shein, AliExpress-style marketplaces, and EU/UK small parcel sellers) the most exposed.

Downstream implications

• Cross-border marketplaces selling into Türkiye lose the flat-rate/simplified

clearance path; landed cost and clearance time both rise for low-value parcels, which is likely to compress order volumes from EU/China-origin small-parcel sellers.

• Domestic Turkish retailers gain a relative price/logistics advantage versus

imported low-value goods — consistent with the broader 2026 import-tariff tightening (Decree 10790) rather than an isolated measure.

• Courier/postal operators (PTT, DHL, private express carriers) face higher

per-parcel processing overhead now that standard declarations replace the simplified flat-rate form.

Open questions

• Whether the standard-tariff exposure meaningfully raises average duty paid

per parcel versus the prior flat maktu rate (depends on HS classification mix of typical low-value imports) — not disclosed in the decree text reviewed.

• Whether EU trading partners (flagged as affected by GTA: Austria, Belgium,

Bulgaria) raise this in EU-Türkiye customs-union consultations.