Vehicle customs clearance in Jordan

What we clear — and for whom

We clear vehicles of every kind: passenger cars, used and new; electric and hybrid; commercial vehicles and trucks; and heavy plant and construction equipment.

And for individuals as much as for traders. Someone importing a single car for himself goes through the same steps as a dealership bringing in a consignment — the difference is scale and frequency, not procedure. There is no minimum.

From where, and to where

We handle vehicles at the points we already work at:

• Aqaba Port — the old and the new. The main entry for vehicles arriving by sea.
• The land crossings for vehicles entering or leaving overland.
• Inside Jordan — moving a vehicle under customs control between one point and another where that is needed.

And inbound and outbound alike: as we bring a vehicle into the Jordanian market, we handle vehicle exports and complete the exit procedure at the point.

Why a vehicle file is not a cargo file

A container holds items described in words. A vehicle is one thing identified by its number — the chassis number — and everything in the file has to match it: the title or export papers, the invoice, the specification, and what the inspection finds.

Two practical consequences follow:

• There is no room for approximation. General cargo may tolerate a looser description. On a vehicle, any difference between the papers and the chassis number, the model or the year of manufacture stops the file until it is corrected at source — usually in another country.
• The value is assessed on the vehicle itself, and it is not necessarily what you paid. The full mechanics of valuation are on its own page, and they apply to vehicles as to anything else.

What you pay — and why we give no percentage

What is paid on a vehicle is not one number: duty and taxes calculated on the tariff heading, the origin and the assessed value; the point and yard costs; and the clearance fee. The largest of them does not come to us.

We give no percentage before reading the vehicle's papers, and we do not present a figure as a ruling — that rests with the Customs Department alone, after valuation. What we do is itemise the components and tell you which are fixed and which depend on a decision that is not ours.

This applies to electric vehicles in particular: they are calculated differently from petrol, but the treatment changes by official decision from time to time — so we do not print a figure here that would be stale in a month. We check what applies at the time of your shipment.

And what about the lane and the inspection

A vehicle file runs like any other: the declaration is filed, the system routes it into a control lane — green, yellow or red — and the procedure runs on to release. A vehicle is by its nature something inspected and matched against its number, so arriving with the papers in order shortens what can be shortened.

We promise neither a lane nor a duration. What we commit to is that your file is ready, so that it is not the reason for the delay.

An option worth costing before you decide

If the vehicle — or the consignment — has no settled destination yet, or you intend to re-export it, depositing it in the free zone rather than clearing it straight away may be worth weighing: it stays outside the market and no duty is paid until you decide. That defers duty rather than removing it, and the storage is rented with its own meter running. We cost both routes and tell you which suits your case — even when the answer is that clearing directly is simpler and cheaper.

What we need from you to start

• The chassis number — the key to the whole file
• The vehicle papers — title or export certificate as the case may be
• The invoice and country of origin
• Model, year and engine type — petrol, diesel, hybrid or electric
• The expected point of entry and arrival date
• Photographs of the vehicle if you have them — they save a great many questions

From those we tell you what your file will need, what your papers are missing, and what to ask the seller for before shipping rather than after. Send them over, with no obligation.

And if the vehicle is crossing rather than entering the Jordanian market, that is transit rather than import, with its own declaration and guarantees: Iraq · Saudi Arabia and the Gulf · Syria.