How to export goods

1. 1

   Discover

   Step 1: Write a short export plan and choose a market

   Government export roadmaps start in the same place: check that your capacity, cash flow and staff can carry export orders, then write a short plan with goals, a budget, a timeline and the markets you will try first¹.

   Compare a few markets on evidence before you pick one: demand and how fast it is growing, competitors, the tariff, product standards and how the goods would travel. Free official tools help. The Rules of Origin Facilitator, run by ITC with the World Customs Organization and the World Trade Organization, draws its tariffs from ITC’s Market Access Map, and the European Commission’s Access2Markets covers tariffs, origin, procedures and product requirements for trade with the European Union^3,9. Start with one or two markets and one product line.

   What this step produces

   • A one-page export plan
   • A shortlist of one to three markets

   Common mistake: Letting the first inquiry from abroad choose the market, instead of comparing two or three.

   With Promote:Global

   The Demand explorer ranks countries by how much of your product they import, how fast that is growing and how hard the market is to enter, from UN Comtrade and WITS data, with the year of every figure, for 1 AI action. A market’s page adds the economy and the investment climate from World Bank indicators, and Export readiness counts the requirements you have already done, from your own records.

   The Demand explorer Markets

   

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2. 2

   Prepare

   Step 2: Classify your product with its HS code

   The Harmonized System, run by the World Customs Organization, gives every product a six-digit code shared by more than 200 countries. Each country adds digits of its own for its tariff, so the full code can differ between your country and the market². Find the six-digit code first, then the destination’s own tariff line.

   Where you are unsure, ask a customs broker or the customs authority. Some authorities issue a binding ruling on how a product is classified, which is worth having for high-value or repeat goods⁹.

   What this step produces

   • The six-digit HS code
   • The destination’s tariff line

   Common mistake: Letting a courier or a forwarder guess the code, or assuming the digits after the first six are the same in both countries².

   With Promote:Global

   Each product you add holds its HS code, and the code is yours to confirm. If you do not know it, the Demand explorer can find a code from a description for 2 AI actions. If a product has no code yet, the plan starts with a step to classify it for customs. A suggested code is not a customs ruling.

   Tools

3. 3

   Prepare

   Step 3: Check the duty, the rules of origin and the product rules

   Look up the import duty in the market, and whether a trade agreement between the two countries offers a lower rate. The lower rate applies only if your goods meet that agreement’s rule of origin and you can prove it. The Rules of Origin Facilitator shows the product-specific rules, and the documents that prove origin, for more than 350 agreements³.

   Check the market’s rules for the product itself as well: labeling, safety, plant and animal health, and certification⁹.

   What this step produces

   • The duty rate, standard and preferential
   • Proof of origin, where you claim a lower rate
   • A list of the product rules to meet

   Common mistake: Claiming a preferential rate without the origin evidence to support it³.

   With Promote:Global

   Export check gives the duty your product pays in the market, standard and preferential, with its source and year, the origin status, the documents the shipment needs with who issues each, and the checks to make before it ships. The Origin qualifier then walks the agreement’s origin rule one question at a time and gives a self-assessed verdict. Both are free, and both are guidance, not a customs ruling.

   Export check and the Origin qualifier

   

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4. 4

   Prepare

   Step 4: Check whether the goods need an export license

   Most goods ship without a license. Goods on a control list, such as military and dual-use items, and sales to sanctioned destinations or end users need a license or another authorization, and checking is the exporter’s job. In the European Union, dual-use exports fall under Regulation (EU) 2021/821, which sets out the kinds of authorization available⁴. Other countries keep their own control lists, so check the one that applies to you.

   Check the buyer, the end user and the end use as well as the product. Keep a record of why no license was needed, and where one is, apply well before the goods are due to ship.

   What this step produces

   • An export license or authorization, where needed
   • A record of why none was needed

   Common mistake: Checking the product against the control list but not the end user or what the goods will be used for.

   You do this step yourself

   Promote:Global does not decide whether your goods need an export license and does not apply for one. Check your country’s control list and sanctions rules yourself, and apply to the authority that issues licenses. The plan has no step for this, so add one (see Make the plan fit this route, below).

5. 5

   Connect

   Step 5: Identify buyers, and check them before you give credit

   Exporters meet buyers at trade shows and on trade missions, through their national export agency and their industry association, through referrals and online. Talk to several, ask each about its business and its customers, and quote only once you understand what it needs.

   Before you sell on credit, check the buyer: trade and bank references and a credit report. The less you know about a buyer, the more secure the payment method should be^6,8.

   What this step produces

   • A shortlist of buyers
   • References and a credit report for any buyer you will give credit

   Common mistake: Offering open account terms to a buyer you have not checked⁶.

   With Promote:Global

   On the project, Search for possible buyers looks on the open web for end buyers and importers of your product in the market, ranked by fit to your product and route, for 1 AI action. You can set the buyer type to importers, distributors, wholesalers, retailers or sales agents. Each result says where it was found and is a lead to check before you make contact, which you can save to the project. If your chamber or trade agency works with you on Promote:Global, you can ask it for an introduction, and the other side decides. Promote:Global does not check anyone’s credit: add the credit check as a step after the buyer step, and do it yourself with your bank or a credit agency.

   Finding connections Introductions and consent

   

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6. 6

   Prepare

   Step 6: Price the sale, and name an Incoterm and its place

   Build the quote from the cost of the goods, packing, freight, insurance, duties and your margin, then state where you deliver with an Incoterms rule and a named place. Incoterms 2020, in force since 1 January 2020, is the current edition, and the International Chamber of Commerce’s page shows nothing newer¹⁰. It has 11 rules: seven for any mode of transport and four for sea and inland waterway only⁵.

   An Incoterm says who arranges and pays for transport and insurance, who clears customs and where the risk passes to the buyer. It does not set the price, the payment terms, when ownership passes or how disputes are settled, so those go in the sales contract⁵.

   A first shipment, end to end. Say you quote 400 cartons to an importer abroad, CIP its warehouse. Under CIP you pay the carriage to that warehouse and insure the goods on the way, so both go into your price, while the risk passes to the buyer when you hand the goods to the first carrier, and the import clearance is the buyer’s¹¹. The importer then works out its own landed cost: your price plus the duty and taxes it pays at import, which is why it asks for a proforma invoice first. Once it orders, the proforma becomes the commercial invoice, with the same description, quantities and values as the packing list and the transport document⁷. And the payment terms decide what happens to those documents: with 30 percent in advance and the balance by documentary collection, the bank hands the documents to the buyer only against payment⁶.

   What this step produces

   • A quotation or proforma invoice
   • A sales contract with the Incoterm and its named place

   Common mistake: Using a sea-only rule, such as FOB, for goods that travel by air or road⁵.

   With Promote:Global

   Landed cost adds goods value, freight, insurance, duty, tax and fees, and shows the customs value and the cash needed at import, each line marked as your figure, an estimate or a live lookup. On the web, Export check lets you set the transport, the Incoterm and its named place, and how you will be paid. Both are free, and the project’s Confirm duty and landed cost step opens them already filled in.

   Landed cost and Export check

7. 7

   Prepare

   Step 7: Agree how you will be paid, and cover the risk

   Four methods are common, from the safest for the exporter to the riskiest: cash in advance, a letter of credit, a documentary collection and open account⁶. With a letter of credit, a bank undertakes to pay once you present documents that meet its terms, so the documents must match it exactly. With a collection, the banks pass the documents to the buyer against payment or a promise to pay, without a bank’s own undertaking⁶.

   If buyers expect open account terms, export credit insurance covers you against a buyer that cannot or will not pay and against political risk. It usually covers a share of the loss, not all of it⁸.

   What this step produces

   • Payment terms in the sales contract
   • A letter of credit or collection instructions, where used
   • An export credit insurance policy, where used

   Common mistake: Presenting documents that differ from the letter of credit in any detail, which lets the bank refuse to pay⁶.

   You do this step yourself

   Promote:Global does not check a buyer’s credit, arrange a letter of credit or insure a sale: agree those with your bank and an export credit insurer. Find service providers has banking and insurance and risk categories, where firms list themselves, and the plan adds a step to present the documents and collect payment when you are paid by letter of credit or collection.

   Service providers

8. 8

   Prepare

   Step 8: Prepare the export documents

   A typical set is a proforma invoice that later becomes the commercial invoice, a packing list, the transport document (a bill of lading for sea, an air waybill for air), a certificate of origin where the buyer or customs needs one, and any license and export declaration⁷. Customs uses the commercial invoice to assess duty, and it should state the Incoterms rule^7,12.

   Make every document tell the same story: the same description, quantities, weights, values and parties on each one.

   What this step produces

   • Commercial invoice and packing list
   • Bill of lading or air waybill
   • Certificate of origin, where required

   Common mistake: Details that differ between the invoice, the packing list and the transport document⁷.

   With Promote:Global

   Export documents, on the web, fills a commercial invoice, a proforma invoice or a packing list from the project, to check, print or save to the project. Export check lists the documents the shipment needs, by stage, with who issues each, and Meridian on the project can propose a list of documents for your route as a card, which changes nothing until you approve it.

   Export documents Meridian

9. 9

   Grow

   Step 9: Choose a forwarder and a customs broker, and book the freight

   A freight forwarder books the transport and can handle the documents, the freight rates, cargo insurance and customs clearance; a customs broker is a licensed specialist in classification, duty and customs filings^12,13. Neither is required by law in most places, but both are worth their fee on a new route or a large shipment.

   Choose on experience with your goods and your destination, not on the freight rate alone. Check whether your country needs an exporter number before the goods can be declared: the UK and the European Union, for example, require an EORI number¹².

   What this step produces

   • A freight booking
   • The export declaration
   • An exporter number, where required

   Common mistake: Choosing a forwarder on the freight rate alone, without asking about its experience on your route.

   With Promote:Global

   Find service providers lists logistics and freight, and customs and compliance firms that list themselves on Promote:Global; whether one is listed for your market varies. A request to a firm carries your company’s contact card, which you see before it is sent, and the firm answers in Messages. Promote:Global does not book freight or file customs declarations.

   Service providers

10. 10

    Grow

    Step 10: Ship, get paid and learn from the first order

    Track the shipment, send or present the documents as the payment terms require, and confirm that the buyer has cleared the goods. Keep a file for every shipment, because customs and export control authorities can ask to see the records⁴.

    Then review what went well and what did not, and decide whether to repeat the order, appoint a partner in the market, or add a second market.

    What this step produces

    • Proof of delivery and of payment
    • A records file for the shipment

    Common mistake: Treating the first shipment as finished, instead of fixing what it taught you before the second.

    With Promote:Global

    The plan carries the shipment through to Debrief the first shipment and fix the pack. The Revenue tracker adds up the revenue you log, by market and by project, against the goal you set for each market. Promote:Global does not track shipments or collect payment.

    The Revenue tracker

The duty, origin and certificate steps are looked up from your product’s HS code and the two countries, so their number depends on what you sell and where. A step with a condition in brackets appears only where it applies. In your own project, each step names your product and your countries. Building the plan uses no AI action.

On a project, Search for possible buyers looks on the open web for end buyers or importers of the product, or for whoever you describe, ranked by fit, for 1 AI action. A result is a lead to check before you contact anyone, not a confirmed buyer.

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