Bringing cigarettes into Australia LEGALLY?

Ragnar Lothbrok

I know that the duty free allowance is a maximum of a miserly 50 cigarettes in a maximum of two packs. Any cigarettes above the limit and I will be taxed on the entire amount of cigarettes (ie I have no duty free allowance, in effect).

I am trying to decide whether to buy 400 in the Duty Free shop in Heathrow, then declare them at customs in Perth airport. The cost of 400 B&H is £80 sterling, and then I'd have to pay the tax on all 400 of them when entering Australia.

Is it worth it? Am I just better off bringing 50 cigarettes into the country and buying cigarettes normally when I get there?

The Australian Embassy didn't answer my email query, and I am unable to find this information on the Australian customs website.

Cigarettes are massively expensive in Australia, and as a 25+ per day smoker I will have to spend over €550 there just to smoke for the month.

Please..........NO judgement on my smoking habit, and no replies telling me to stop before I go there

coylemj

You'll probably have to pay the excise and sales (VAT) tax. And in all probability they will, as a policy, discourage this import route by charging you a packet (sic) so you end up paying more than local (retail) price.

Because if you could sail up to customs, pay the tax and still save on local prices, they would have queues in arrivals all day processing smokers and their imports. You can see why they would discourage this, better to collect the tax via the retail channel than doing fiddly paperwork for tourists and their cartons of UK fags.

And they could still trip you up because the full carton doesn't have the required severe health warnings - something that the packs you can bring in duty-free are probably exempt from. So they could simply confiscate the lot with no option to pay taxes.

Too many unknowns, I wouldn't risk it.

mandrake04

You have to pay Duty/Taxes

Travellers arriving in Australia
As a traveller, you can bring tobacco products with you if you’re aged 18 years or older.

You do not need a permit to bring in tobacco products as a traveller.
You’re allowed to bring in duty-free:
one unopen packet of up to 25 cigarettes or 25 grams of other tobacco products
one open packet of cigarettes

If you bring in tobacco you must:
declare any tobacco you have with you above the duty free allowance
pay all relevant duty and taxes that apply on arrival into Australia
If you bring more tobacco than the duty free allowance, you will need to pay duty on all of your tobacco, not just the amount above the allowance.
ABF officers will tell you how much duty you must pay when you arrive in Australia. The amount of duty you pay depends on the amount of tobacco you are bringing in.

If you do not declare the tobacco you have with you above the duty free allowance, you might be prosecuted or have your visa cancelled.
Duty free allowances apply to visitors, Australian residents, Airline or Ship Crew Members.

If you want to bring in more than 1.5 kg of chewing tobacco or snuff you will need to get permission from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

https://www.abf.gov.au/importing-exporting-and-manufacturing/tariff-classification/current-tariff/schedule-3/section-iv/chapter-24#carg

Ragnar Lothbrok

Thanks for the replies.

I have read the info posted above on the ABF website already. It doesn't give me enough info to work out whether it's worth bringing in the cigarettes from a financial point of view.

I suspect that it is probably far easier, and probably cheaper, to bring in 50 cigarettes and buy the others in Australia, as coylemj suggests.

Alternatively, I could stop smoking before then :D:D:D:D

mandrake04

I think reading that each cigarette has a duty of around $0.90 which is about €0.55. Smoking is extremely expensive in Australia as they increase the tax as an incentive to stop smoking. It worked as a lot of people have stopped smoking or only smoke occasionally now.

Muahahaha

OP Id say you might get a correct answer on the Australia forums of Trip Advisor or Reddit.

That said I would imagine by the time customs put taxes on them for import you would be paying very near the retail price in the shops. I doubt they would make it worth peoples while.

I think now is a good time for you to buy a e-cigarette, even if you only use it for the month there you'll save a fair wedge rather than buying cigarettes locally.

Ragnar Lothbrok

Muahahaha wrote: »

OP I think now is a good time to buy a e-cigarette, even if you only use it for the month there you'll save a fair wedge rather than buying cigarettes locally.

YUK

Muahahaha

For a saving of €550 you might put up with it :pac:

Another option is to smoke roll ups over there as a lot of Aussies do as there is more value in a packet of tobacco than a pack of cigarettes. It is $27 a pack over there, I think they are the most expensive smokes anywhere in the world.

Ragnar Lothbrok

As a heavy smoker and arachnophobe too, I do sometimes question whether Australia should be the last place on the planet I should visit. Unfortunately, my daughter and her husband live there, so I don't have a choice!

I don't like rollies. I am just going to have to suck it up and spend money on tipped cigarettes out there and maybe miss out on something non-essential like food

I might try Australian brands as they seem cheaper than either Benson & Hedges or JPS.

Tacitus Kilgore

Where's your stopover? Might get them cheaper again in the gulf or asia??


When I made stopovers in KL en route to Aus I always picked up 2x500g packs of amber leaf - 20x50g packs in total (total cost about €35 IIRC) and brought them in in my carry-on, never got fingered (thank be the feck) but was always more than aware that I would need a fair few hundred $ available and ready to make amends if needed.

Saved me a fuckin fortune though

Ragnar Lothbrok

Tacitus Kilgore wrote: »

Where's your stopover? Might get them cheaper again in the gulf or asia??


When I made stopovers in KL en route to Aus I always picked up 2x500g packs of amber leaf - 20x50g packs in total (total cost about €35 IIRC) and brought them in in my carry-on, never got fingered (thank be the feck) but was always more than aware that I would need a fair few hundred $ available and ready to make amends if needed.

Saved me a fuckin fortune though

No stop over, direct from London to Perth.

Watched "Nothing to Declare" too many times to want to risk bringing them in without declaring them

Mundo7976

Back in my smoking days i remember winston being an Oz brand, not too bad to smoke at the time. Might be an option if reasonably priced

Tacitus Kilgore

Ragnar Lothbrok wrote: »

No stop over, direct from London to Perth.

Watched "Nothing to Declare" too many times to want to risk bringing them in without declaring them

You'll be crawling after that haul + the immi time in Oz :eek:


Ah what's an airport passage without a bit of paranoia, keeps you on your toes :D

Ragnar Lothbrok

Mundo7976 wrote: »

Back in my smoking days i remember winston being an Oz brand, not too bad to smoke at the time. Might be an option if reasonably priced

Will definitely give them a go. Surely cheaper than the UK/Irish brands.

Muahahaha

Winston definitely cheaper than the mainstream brands. There was also a brand called Holiday that were really cheap too (compared to B&H, Marlboro, etc).

Either way Im told if you spark up a smoke in Australia these days you're viewed as some sort of social leper, the govt really has cracked down hard on it and society has followed with vigor

mandrake04

Muahahaha wrote: »

Either way Im told if you spark up a smoke in Australia these days you're viewed as some sort of social leper, the govt really has cracked down hard on it and society has followed with vigor

North Sydney council are bringing in no smoking on the streets, Parks, beaches or any public area.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/north-sydney-set-to-become-australia-s-first-smoke-free-cbd-20180925-p505xn.html

NZ vowed to become first country smoke free by 2025, Australia hasn’t set a deadline but they are chipping away