Article: Customs Value in case Law

In the operations of verifying the reliability of the sales price of goods, declared at the importation stage, the databases held by the Customs Authorities, according to an increasingly common practice in European countries, are increasingly important. In recent years, case law, including that of the European Court of Justice and national Supreme Courts, has provided many important clarifications on customs valuation. Among the many judgments worthy of further study, one should particularly focus on the rulings of the European Court of Justice intervening on the recalculation of the price declared in Customs. In this sense, the judgment of the EU Court of Justice of 9 June 2022 in Case C-187/21 (Fawkes Kft) reaffirmed the obligation of the customs authorities to conduct an effective adversarial procedure and the need to ensure compliance with the strict hierarchical criteria laid down in the EU Customs Code. Ruling on a subject of great interest to traders, this judgment also clarified that the customs value of goods can be re-determined on the basis of data contained in national databases, without there being any obligation to consult EU or other Member States’ databases.