How Inter-Pace works · Duties & taxes · The full guide

What you'll actually pay.

Customs, import VAT, a courier handling fee — the charges that turn a good deal into a bad one. We can't make them disappear. What we can do is tell you they're coming, and never charge you a tax you don't owe.

138 MARKETS · LOCAL CURRENCY
HS CODE + ORIGIN ON EVERY PRODUCT · NO SURPRISES, NO DOUBLE TAX
Choose your region
Bild: KI-Illustration · Inter-Pace
The bill after the bill.

The problem

The bill after the bill.

You order a helmet from abroad. The price looks fine. Three weeks later the courier asks for import VAT, a customs duty and a handling fee before they'll hand it over — often a third of the value on top. Nobody told you, because the shop never worked it out. The charges themselves were always going to be there. Being ambushed by them wasn't. That's the thing we set out to kill.

Who charges what, and why we can’t switch it off.

Why you still pay

Who charges what, and why we can’t switch it off.

  • Customs duty — your country, not usA duty is your government taxing an import as it crosses the border. It's set by your country's tariff schedule against the item's HS code, and it's charged to you as the importer. No seller anywhere can waive it; we can only make sure the code is right so it's calculated correctly and not guessed high.
  • Import VAT — your rate, on your sideMost countries charge their own VAT on imported goods, at the same rate as if you'd bought locally. That's the point of it: it stops foreign shops undercutting the ones in your own town. Because we strip our German VAT out first, you pay your rate once — not ours and yours.
  • The courier's handling feeThe carrier fronts the duty to customs on your behalf and charges you for doing it. It's their fee, not a tax, and it's the one that stings most because it's flat — the same on a visor as on a race suit.
  • The de minimis lineBelow a certain value, many countries skip duty entirely — but the threshold differs everywhere and is falling. It's why one parcel sails through and the next one doesn't, and why we'd rather flag the possibility than promise you a clean run.
Every product carries its customs papers.

What we did about it

Every product carries its customs papers.

Two things decide what a parcel costs at a border: what the item is (its HS tariff code) and where it was made (its country of origin). Most shops hold neither. We carry both on every product in the catalogue — helmets, leathers, carbon, brake pads, the lot. That's what lets a price be calculated honestly for your market instead of guessed.

The setup behind the price

138Markets served
20Languages
24Shipping zones
2Charges, both named up front

How it works for you

Four steps, no homework.

01

Pick your region

Choose your country once. Everything from that point on is calculated for where you actually are.

02

See your currency

Prices switch to your local currency — not a live-converted guess at checkout.

03

Duties made clear

Where duties and import taxes apply, we say so before you check out — not after the parcel lands.

04

Weight-based shipping

Rates are calculated from real weight into 24 zones, so a visor doesn't ship like a full race suit.

One market, one price, no border.

Inside the EU

One market, one price, no border.

Ship within the EU and there's no customs at all — the goods are already in free circulation. Here, and only here, the number you see is the number you pay: your country's VAT is already built into the price, and nothing else is added at the door.

We take our tax off, so yours isn’t on top.

Outside the EU

We take our tax off, so yours isn’t on top.

Cross a customs border and duty and import tax become a fact of life — no shop can wish them away. What a shop can do is not make it worse. Ship outside the EU and we strip German VAT out of the price entirely, so you're taxed once by your own country instead of twice. Then we hand customs the correct tariff code and origin, so your parcel clears cleanly instead of sitting in a shed. That's the difference between a delay and a doorstep.

A price you can’t trust isn’t a price. It’s a down payment.

Which is why we'd rather tell you what's coming than let the courier do it.

The verdict

No surprises beats no charges — because only one of them is honest.

Inside the EU, the price is the price. Outside it, duty and import VAT are your country's call, not ours — so we say so before you check out, take our own VAT off, and give customs the right code and origin. You'll know what's coming. That's the promise we can actually keep.

Choose your region

Set your market on the Country & region page — prices, shipping and duties all follow it.