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What are flat rates?
These are rates of duty that are applied to the importation of goods for private and personal use so as to simplify classification of goods and calculation of duty. They are used to increase efficiency and speedy clearance of travellers.

Flat rates of duty are covered in Chapter 98 of the Customs and Excise Tariff Handbook published in Statutory Instrument 111 of 2012.

On which goods are flat rates of assessment applicable?
Flat rates of assessment are applicable on goods imported occasionally by individuals for personal or family use, such as household goods, books, clothing, food and food items, and many others. The goods must be of a kind or quantity that there is no indication that they are imported for any commercial purposes.

Which goods cannot be cleared under flat rates of assessment?
1.    Goods imported for sale or of a commercial nature

2.    The following goods, even if they are sent in consignments to private individuals or imported by a traveller upon his person or in his or her personal baggage:

Literature published in braille;

Braille typewriters and braille watches;

Apparatus specially designed to assist physically handicapped persons to drive a motor vehicle;

Contact lenses and spectacle lenses for sight correction and the frames;

Orthopaedic appliances such as artificial parts of the body, crutches, hearing aids, artificial teeth and pacemakers for stimulating heart muscles;
Wheelchairs and other carriages for physically handicapped persons;

Motor vehicles and motor cycles.

The above goods are excluded from the flat rates of assessment because they attract special rates of duty.

Please take note of the following:
Goods assessed at flat rates are not charged Surtax and Value Added Tax (VAT).

The flat rates of duty shall not apply to goods imported under the conditions set above if the person entitled has – before the said flat rate is applied to them or, in the case of importation by post, prior to the payment of the Customs Duty – requested that the goods be subject to the Customs

Duties appropriate to them, in which case all the goods making up the consignment shall be subject to the import duties appropriate to them.

This article was compiled by the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority for information purposes only. ZIMRA shall not accept responsibility for loss or damage arising from use of material in this article and no liability will attach to the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority.

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