“Tighten” the proud cover of “hand-carried goods”

The Government Office has just sent an urgent document to 5 ministries and branches including: Finance, Industry and Trade, Public Security, Health, and Agriculture and Rural Development to convey the opinion of Permanent Deputy Prime Minister Truong Hoa Binh directing to strengthen management of hand-carried goods.

Accordingly, the Deputy Prime Minister agreed with the proposal on solutions to strengthen management proposed by the Ministry of Finance in February 2018. The Deputy Prime Minister requested the Ministry of Public Security to establish special projects to combat and destroy networks that take advantage of policies on goods as gifts to smuggle goods at international airport border gates.

At the same time, the Government leader also requested the Ministry of Finance to direct the General Department of Customs to strengthen inspection and supervision of goods such as luggage, gifts and presents from abroad into Vietnam; urgently develop software to manage the number of tax exemptions according to the quota for goods such as gifts and presents for unified management nationwide.

In addition, the Deputy Prime Minister also assigned the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Health, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to urgently review, revise, and supplement specialized management policies for goods such as luggage, gifts, and presents from foreign countries into Vietnam...

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From a legal perspective, lawyer Quach Thanh Luc, Director of Hanoi Tinh Hoa Law Firm, analyzed: Decision 31 clearly stipulates: "Regular entrants, according to the provisions of Clause 5, Article 58 of Decree No. 08/2015/ND-CP dated January 21, 2015, are not entitled to the tax-free baggage allowance prescribed in Clauses 1, 2, 3 and 5 of this Article for each entry, but are entitled to the tax-free baggage allowance once every 90 days". Regular entrants due to the nature of their work include: Aircraft operators and service staff on international flights...

“That means if the regulations are strictly implemented, flight attendants and pilots cannot bring goods back to the country arbitrarily, but can only bring them back once every 90 days. In reality, with so many goods being “flown” back to the country, it is possible that this regulation has not been strictly implemented,”Mr. Luc expressed his opinion.

According to Mr. Luc, if we want to control hand-carried goods in the market, we must do it from the source. That means we must answer the question of why goods from abroad can easily slip through the control gates. If it is “air” goods, who is condoning it; if it is “public” goods, who is helping…?

To say it out loud, the fact that hand-carried goods are rampant in the market today, mixed with real and fake, is a chain of flaws, not just one particular link.

Commenting on the current market of hand-carried goods in Vietnam, economic expert Phan Hung Son used a very simple word to describe it: "Chaos". According to Mr. Son, hand-carried goods, because they are considered to be brought directly from abroad, are by default not to have documents of origin. But it is ironic that many Vietnamese people blindly believe that if there is not a single Vietnamese word on the packaging, then it is considered "genuine goods".

Because of that psychological gap, many dishonest traders have used a familiar trick to profit from consumers' trust by mixing fake and counterfeit goods under the guise of hand-carried goods.