I’m based in Australia and my store sells high ticket items, averaging about US$1000k per transaction. Around 80% of my sales are currently to America.
With the end of the de minimis exemption in the US, I would like to include import duty at checkout where required so that there’s no unexpected costs for customers. This applies only to items valued at less than US$800 (the majority of my listings fall above this threshold and aren’t affected).
Shopify has a tool to collect local duty and import tax at checkout, but when activated it is administered to *all* US transactions, not just those to which it applies (i.e. those valued at <US$800).
Is there a way that I can restrict the Shopify duty and import tax tool to apply only to select product listings?
Or conversely, is there a way that I can amend prices *only* for US customers to cover the applicable duties?
At the moment, I have to email US customers a PayPal invoice for the duties post-sale, which is messy, unprofessional, and unnecessarily time consuming.
I ran into a similar headache with US orders, so I totally get the frustration. At the moment, Shopify’s “Duty & Import tax at checkout” tool is an all-or-nothing setting — you can’t conditionally apply it only for orders under $800. That’s why it’s hitting every US checkout regardless of value.
A couple of workarounds I’ve seen merchants use:
Markets + Price Adjustments
Inside Shopify Markets, you can adjust product pricing for the US only. For listings that are under $800, you could build the duty into the price just for US customers, while leaving everything above $800 unchanged. Not perfect, but it means customers won’t get a surprise invoice later.
Apps / Custom Logic
Some merchants add conditional logic via apps (e.g. Custom Pricing / Duty apps like Zonos, Avalara, or Global-E). These can apply duties dynamically based on cart value, so you can set the rule “collect duty only if order < $800.”
Tagging Products / Collections
If you only have a handful of products under $800, one option is to put them in a separate collection and use an app or custom script (if on Shopify Plus) to target just those products with duties.
Right now there’s no simple Shopify toggle to say “only apply to orders below $800,” but either adjusting your US pricing in Markets or using a third-party duty app should solve it in a cleaner way than sending PayPal invoices.
Hope that helps; it’s definitely something a lot of us merchants outside the US are running into.
Thank you. I’ve just implemented a solution for this problem based on your advice. I went with your first suggestion (Markets + Price Adjustments). It was a little bit complicated and took me a few hours to update, but it seems to be working well now. And it’s a much better option than sending additional invoices post-sale!
Thanks so much for your detailed response and excellent advice.
A couple of workarounds I’ve seen merchants use: