To further boost cross-border e-commerce exports, the General Administration of Customs recently announced that starting April 1, 2026, the inter-customs return model for retail exports of cross-border e-commerce will be rolled out nationwide.

Inter-customs returns for cross-border e-commerce retail exports (customs supervision code: 9610) mean that when products exported by cross-border e-commerce enterprises are returned overseas, they are no longer required to be sent back to the original customs office of export. Instead, enterprises can flexibly choose any customs port across the country to complete the import return procedures.

It is reported that the General Administration of Customs issued an announcement in November 2024, launching a pilot program of the inter-customs return supervision model for cross-border e-commerce retail exports in 20 directly affiliated customs districts including Beijing, Tianjin, Dalian, Harbin, Shanghai, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Chengdu and Urumqi, effective December 15 of the same year. After one year of piloting, the model is now ready for nationwide implementation.

According to the newly released announcement, inter-customs returns only apply to cross-border e-commerce retail export goods under the "9610 model". Meanwhile, returned goods under this model can be sent back across customs regions, but only to customs-supervised operation sites or venues engaged in cross-border e-commerce retail export business.

In addition, the announcement clarifies that enterprises conducting inter-customs return business for cross-border e-commerce retail exports shall operate in compliance, have independent functional operation zones, and open the data of their production and operation systems to customs or integrate them with customs information systems.

As a new form of international trade, cross-border e-commerce has developed rapidly in recent years and become a key engine driving China's foreign trade growth. However, along with its fast expansion, cross-border returns have long been a pain point and bottleneck restricting the industry's development.

A relevant official from the General Administration of Customs stated that the launch of the inter-customs return policy aims to solve the industry's pain points of "difficult returns, high costs and long cycles" under the traditional model, providing enterprises with a more efficient and cost-effective reverse logistics channel, thus improving consumers' shopping experience and enhancing enterprises' international competitiveness.

Furthermore, combined with the preferential tax policies for returned cross-border e-commerce export goods jointly issued by the Ministry of Finance and two other authorities in February this year, a synergistic and superimposed policy effect will be formed, jointly reducing costs and improving efficiency for cross-border e-commerce enterprises.

Source: Xinhua News Agency