Recently, the first departure tax refund port in central Zhejiang Province opened at Yiwu Airport. This marks the full coverage of departure tax refund services at Zhejiang's airport ports, further enhancing the shopping experience for global merchants and contributing to the province's development as a high-level open and strong province.

 

"Previously, after purchasing small commodities in Yiwu, I had to take the tax-refund goods and receipts to Hangzhou to process the departure tax refund. Now, I can do it directly at Yiwu Airport. I just submit my passport, tax refund application form, and sales invoice, and the customs verification is completed in less than 10 minutes—it's so convenient!" On the second day after the Yiwu Airport departure tax refund port opened, Mexican businessman Ruiz processed the first departure tax refund for an overseas tourist. He said that Yiwu is one of his main shopping destinations, and the establishment of the departure tax refund port in Yiwu greatly facilitates his and his Mexican customers' purchasing.

 

The departure tax refund policy refers to the policy that allows overseas tourists to receive tax refunds on goods purchased at designated tax-refund stores and carried out of the country, in accordance with regulations. In April of this year, the "Notice on Further Optimizing the Departure Tax Refund Policy to Expand Inbound Consumption," jointly issued by six departments, officially came into effect. A series of optimization measures have provided new impetus for boosting inbound consumption and promoting international tourism.

To fully unleash the policy dividends, Hangzhou Customs strengthened cooperation with Zhejiang Provincial Finance and Taxation departments, efficiently completing the joint acceptance inspection of the Yiwu Airport departure tax refund port. This streamlined the entire service process from "in-store shopping" to "on-site tax refund" and then to "customs verification." Simultaneously, Hangzhou Customs has set up dedicated personnel to provide passengers with one-stop services for goods verification and supervision upon departure. A pilot program has been implemented to facilitate the verification of tax-refund goods through "sealing and coding," ensuring full traceability of goods from the store to the port by uniformly packaging and labeling them with unique codes, reducing manual intervention in the verification process.

 

In the first 10 months of this year, Hangzhou Customs verified 3,582 departure tax refund applications, totaling 121 million yuan, representing year-on-year increases of 199% and 117.07%, respectively.

 

Next, the customs will continue to explore electronic and simplified customs clearance models, and, relying on collaborative mechanisms such as "Smart Tourism Shanghai-Hangzhou" and "Smart Tourism Yangtze River Delta," explore mutual recognition of the "packaged and code-printed" verification model among customs authorities in the Yangtze River Delta region, further enhancing the shopping experience for overseas tourists visiting Zhejiang. (Text by Mei Na)