Guarantee

Legislation requires a guarantee to be provided in most cases. This includes transit, inward processing and customs warehousing.

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A guarantee can apply to a single event, but you can also provide a comprehensive guarantee for two or more events, declarations or procedures. To use a comprehensive guarantee, you must have an authorisation.

Individual guarantee

An individual guarantee follows a customs declaration from beginning to end and should refer to a single customs declaration, not several. Use an individual guarantee when submitting a simplified application for inward processing, final use or temporary admission in the customs declaration. It can also be used to create a transit declaration using the normal procedure.

Individual guarantees should cover customs duties and other charges for the individual event. Individual guarantees are not eligible for any deductions.

Swedish Customs accepts guarantees in the following forms:

Bank transfers by Bankgiro to Swedish Customs’ (cash deposit)
Card payment at the customs office
Cash payment at the customs office
Using a frozen account as a deposit (in Swedish) pdf, 125.4 kB.
Credit note (in Swedish) pdf, 290 kB.

In the case of a credit note, Swedish Customs will only accept a guarantee that is worded in accordance with the above appendix and issued by a bank or credit institution approved by the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority.

When you pay your individual deposit, you must also let us know which bank account you would like the refund to be paid into. You can do this using Swedish Customs’ form:

Payment details for guarantee (in Swedish) pdf, 146.9 kB.

If you are at a customs office, you should complete the form when the deposit is paid. In cases where payment is made remotely via bank transfer, you will first be contacted by Swedish Customs; you should then complete the form yourself and send it to the relevant customs office.

Customs clearance offices

Comprehensive guarantee

A comprehensive guarantee authorisation covers customs duties and possibly other charges for two or more events or declarations. A comprehensive guarantee is sometimes a prerequisite for obtaining other authorisations that require a guarantee.

Where the comprehensive guarantee is valid in several countries, such as in transit, you must also provide a guarantee for national taxes and duties.

Based on a risk assessment, Swedish Customs may also in other cases require you to provide a comprehensive guarantee for taxes other than customs duties. An example of such a tax is VAT.

A comprehensive guarantee authorisation covers one procedure, but you can have several comprehensive guarantee authorisations. As a company, you can choose to provide one guarantee document covering all the procedures in question or have one guarantee document per procedure.

Comprehensive guarantee – authorisation

Reference amount

The amount of the comprehensive guarantee must correspond to a reference amount set by Swedish Customs. In your application for a comprehensive guarantee authorisation, you must indicate a preliminary reference amount.

Calculating the reference amount for the comprehensive guarantee

Reduction of the comprehensive guarantee

It is possible to obtain a reduction of the guarantee you provide if all relevant conditions and criteria are met. To obtain a reduction of the guarantee, you must apply for it when you apply for a comprehensive guarantee.

Reduction of the comprehensive guarantee

Keep track of the guarantee

If you have a comprehensive guarantee authorisation, you are obliged to monitor that the current reference amount is not exceeded. You should inform the guarantee office if the reference amount is no longer sufficient by submitting a request for amendment via the Customs Decision System (CDS).

If Swedish Customs determines that the guarantee provided is not sufficient, we will require you to either provide an additional guarantee or replace the original guarantee with a new guarantee.

Upon release for free circulation, the charges in each import declaration are directly charged against the reference amount. If the reference amount is insufficient, the goods in the import declaration will be stopped.

In cases of transit, the charges in each transit are directly charged against the reference amount. If the reference amount is insufficient, no new transit operations can be started.

If you are unsure about your guarantee or reference amount, you can check it in the online service Guarantees.

If the guarantee is not sufficient

Check the size of your guarantee and reference amount in the Guarantees e-service (in Swedish).

Learn how to request a change (in Swedish).

When is the guarantee released?

Swedish Customs must release the guarantee immediately when the debt or obligation to pay other charges has ceased or can no longer be incurred. Where this concerns part of the amount covered by the guarantee, Swedish Customs shall release the corresponding part of the guarantee at your request, unless the amount involved is too small to justify such an action.