International Alcohol Shipping Guide

International Guidelines

Accounts must have an International Special Commodity Alcohol agreement in place before sending alcohol shipments. All shipments of alcohol must be processed for shipment with a UPS-compatible shipping solution such as UPS WorldShip® 2017 or any approved third-party vendor system. All shipments also require an international airwaybill, a detailed commercial invoice, and all B2C shipments must have the UPS Delivery Confirmation Adult Signature Required service.

UPS shall provide the ISC Service pursuant to the UPS International Alcohol Shipping Guide. UPS shall have the right to unilaterally modify or amend any requirements for international wine and/or alcohol shipments and/or the UPS International Alcohol Shipping Guide at any time, without prior notice, and for any reason, including to reflect changes in applicable law. The effective versions of such amendments and the UPS International Alcohol Shipping Guide will be found on this page. The customer shall be responsible for keeping up to date with, and continuing to comply with, any changes that are made from time to time to any documentation, labeling, packaging or other requirements or restrictions referenced in the UPS International Alcohol Shipping Guide.

It is the shipper’s responsibility to know and comply with all applicable international laws and regulations. Every alcohol shipment’s commercial invoice description and alcohol label requires the following information, and in addition, the items listed below for the specific country:

Merchandise description in detail (include date of production);
Quantity, including number of containers (bottles or cans) and total liters in shipment;
Packing specification (in bottle, can, etc.);
Brand;
Origin / producing area;
Alcohol % (strength);
Harmonized Tariff Code (commercial invoice);
Winery information (wine);
Malt concentration (beer); and
Whether the shipment is for commercial use, or is for personal consumption and not for resale/commercial use (commercial invoice).

Common Requirements

European Union (EU) exports to non-EU countries under duty suspension are not permitted unless the export declaration is completed by the shipper ahead of time. When shipping internationally to a country in the European Union, consider the following:

The contractual service covers the customs clearance of alcohol at the port of entry, where duty, VAT and excise duty must be paid. A customs clearance of alcohol for free circulation with a subsequent transport of alcohol under the excise duty suspension regime is not possible unless stated otherwise below. The customs clearance in the EU country and the subsequent transport to another EU member state is not part of the service unless otherwise stated.

Alcoholic beverages are subject to excise duty. Excise duty will usually apply on the amount of beverage in the shipment and the percentage of alcohol. The calculation of excise duty for beer depends on the destination country — some countries calculate on the percentage of alcohol, and others on degree of Plato. The information must be shown on the invoice to help determine the excise duty.

The importation of wine and wine products is subject to the inclusion of: a certificate drawn up by a competent body, included on a list to be made public by the Commission, in the product’s country of origin; and an analysis report drawn up by a body or department designated by the product’s country of origin, in so far as the product is intended for direct human consumption. No certificate or analysis report needs to be presented for products originating in and exported from third countries in labeled containers of not more than five liters fitted with a non-reusable closing device, where the total quantity transported, whether or not made up of separate consignments, does not exceed 100 liters.

The import of wine and wine products is regulated by a market organization of the European Union, with rules on labeling and presentation of wine and additional documentation. The labels of wine and wine products have to show some of the following compulsory particulars: the category of the product (e.g. ‘wine’, ‘sparkling wine’, ‘liquor wine’), the protected designation or protected geographical indication if the wine has such a protection, the actual alcohol strength by volume, an indication of provenance, an indication of the bottler, or an indication of the producer or vendor in the case of ‘sparkling wine’ and other product categories of sparkling wine. The rules are stated in EU regulation 2009/491. The regulation can be checked on the EU website eur-lex.europa.eu.