China's Tariff Law: What Importers and Exporters Must Know

From regulations to statute: what actually changed

The PRC Tariff Law was adopted on 26 April 2024 at the Ninth Session of the Standing Committee of the Fourteenth National People's Congress, published as Presidential Order No. 23, and took effect on 1 December 2024. It has 7 chapters and 72 articles, and Article 72 expressly repeals the Import and Export Tariff Regulations that had governed Chinese tariffs for decades. The point of the legislation is to implement the principle of tax legality — bringing tariff rules up to the level of a law passed by the legislature — while keeping the overall tax burden broadly unchanged. For importers and exporters, the practical effect is less about new rates and more about the consolidation, transparency and procedure of the rules that were previously scattered across regulations and notices.

The machinery every shipment runs through

• The tariff schedule and classification. The Import and Export Tariff Schedule is part of the Tariff Law, and goods are classified by HS heading. Classification is where most duty disputes start — a single wrong heading can change the rate several-fold.
• Rules of origin. Origin determines whether a preferential or agreement rate applies. The law distinguishes goods wholly obtained in a country from goods substantially transformed there, with cumulation and minimal-processing rules doing much of the work in free-trade agreements.
• Customs valuation. The dutiable value follows the principles of the WTO Customs Valuation Agreement, with the transaction value of the imported goods as the primary basis, adjusted and fallback methods where it cannot be used.
• Rates. The law organizes the rate structure — most-favored-nation, agreement, preferential, general, export and tariff-rate-quota rates — into a single framework.
• Who pays. The taxpayer is the consignee for imports and the consignor for exports; for cross-border e-commerce, the platform operator, logistics enterprise or customs broker acts as withholding agent.

Late payment: 0.05% per day, and other running costs

Unpaid or underpaid duty attracts a late-payment surcharge of 0.05% of the outstanding amount per day, running from the due date — a figure worth building into any cash-flow model for a shipment held up in a classification or valuation dispute. The law also consolidates the mechanisms for supplementary and recovery collection, and extends the window for claiming a duty refund to three years, up from one year under the old regime. A separation between the release of goods and the final determination of the duty amount, and provision for consolidated payment, are among the operational changes most useful to high-volume importers.

The dispute route that no longer requires paying first

This is the change that matters most in practice. Under Article 66 of the Tariff Law, where a party disagrees with customs' determination of the taxpayer, the classification, origin, dutiable value or applicable rate, or with a decision on reduction or exemption, or on the confirmation of the tax due, a refund or the late-payment surcharge, the party must first apply to the next-higher level customs authority for administrative reconsideration, and may bring an administrative lawsuit only after that reconsideration. Crucially, the Tariff Law does not require the party to pay the disputed duty or surcharge, or provide security, before seeking reconsideration — the "pay first, dispute later" (清税前置) precondition that historically applied to tariff disputes has been removed.

Do not confuse this with the separate regime under Article 88 of the Tax Administration Law, which still retains a tax-clearance precondition for certain tax disputes. The Tariff Law's route is its own, and it is more favorable to the taxpayer than the old rule.

RCEP and preferential rates

For goods from RCEP members, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership entered into force for China on 1 January 2022. The operational rules sit in the General Administration of Customs Decree No. 255 on RCEP rules of origin and Announcement No. 106 of 2021. To claim the preferential rate, the goods must be in the concession list, qualify as RCEP-originating, and be imported with a valid certificate of origin — issued by customs or the trade promotion body, or a self-declaration by an approved exporter — and meet the direct-transport requirement. Getting the origin documentation right is the difference between the RCEP rate and the default rate.

Where enforcement crosses into something more serious

A tariff error is an administrative matter; under-declaring value, misstating origin or false classification with intent to evade duty crosses into smuggling. Criminal liability for smuggling ordinary goods and articles sits in Article 153 of the Criminal Law, and the administrative penalties are separate from the duty and surcharge. The boundary between an honest mistake and a prosecutable offense is intent and materiality, so keep the documentation that shows a defensible basis for every classification, valuation and origin position. Our international trade team handles tariff disputes, reconsideration and customs penalty cases, and our guide to customs penalties and administrative review covers the penalty regime in more depth.

The Tariff Law's provisions and the administrative measures under it are amended periodically; confirm the operative text and any current notices before relying on a specific article or rate. The statute is new enough that its interpretive practice is still forming, which is precisely when a well-documented position pays off.