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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
Currently in Ukraine, international postal shipments worth up to 150 euros are not subject to VAT. However, the government is actively discussing the abolition of this exemption. The introduction of 20% VAT on all parcels is being considered. That would include those costing less than 150 euros. The new rules are expected to take effect no earlier than 2027.
Ukraine’s Minister of Finance, Serhiy Marchenko, in an interview with 24 Channel explained what this initiative is really about and how it will affect Ukrainians during the war.
Why the government paid attention to the specifics of parcel taxation in 2026
Why has the government decided to pay such close attention to the rules for taxing international parcels now? What problem is this supposed to solve, and what effect on the state budget do you expect?
The reform is intended to level the tax rules for all market players in Ukraine — both those who manufacture goods in the country and those who import. The current tax exemption creates unequal conditions specifically for Ukrainian producers. And that’s unfair.
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At the same time, over recent years the scale of international e-commerce in Ukraine has grown many times over, and with it the volumes of goods imported without VAT for items up to 150 euros.
According to Customs data, in 2025 international postal and express shipments amounted to 167,3 billion hryvnias. 92,9 billion hryvnias, or 55,5% of the value of such shipments, were not taxed due to the existing exemption. In 2023 this indicator was about 40 billion hryvnias. So in just two years the volume of non-taxed imports more than doubled.
The trend continues this year as well. In the first seven months of 2026 the total value of international parcels already amounted to 136,3 billion hryvnias. Of these, 56,8 billion hryvnias, or 42%, were not subject to VAT because of the exemption.
We are no longer talking about a small exception for individual consumer purchases, but about a significant segment of imports.
Will the new taxation rules affect Ukraine’s budget?
Ukraine is at war, and every additional hryvnia in the budget matters. Can it be said that introducing taxation on international parcels is primarily a step to find additional resources to finance defense?
Ukraine’s balance of payments situation is difficult. The structural deficit of the balance of payments has been widening each year of the full-scale war and for the past year already amounts to 50 billion US dollars. The government must take measures to slow the trend in which imports grow at a much higher rate than exports. In this context, measures such as abolishing the VAT exemption for cheap imports are an important decision to improve the trade balance.
International financial assistance of between 40 and 50 billion US dollars annually compensates for this gap, but does not eliminate the structural vulnerability of the economy. So this is also a wartime economic policy issue: supporting the domestic economy, creating jobs by expanding production, without creating artificial tax incentives in favor of imports.
Also indicative is the dynamic over 7 months of 2026: import growth rates are almost eight times higher than export growth rates — plus 33% versus 4%.
And of course, this is a decision aimed at supporting the state budget.
How will this decision affect the fight against the shadow economy?
What is the main motivation in making such a decision: increasing revenues to the budget or fighting shadow imports?
When there is an unfair tax exemption that allows a significant portion of goods to effectively avoid taxation, it’s not only budget losses. It’s also an incentive to develop schemes that undermine fair competition.
Therefore this decision has long been overdue and is a response to the demands of law-abiding Ukrainian business. Today, thanks to the exemption, huge volumes of goods are supplied to Ukraine that compete with Ukrainian businesses' products but operate under different tax conditions, having a preference. Often, this is a preference for marketplaces in countries that are not friendly to Ukraine.
Now Ukraine places foreign producers in a better position than our own businesses. This situation must be corrected. Ukrainian entrepreneurs have always paid 20% VAT. Foreign online sellers and importers have not. Abolishing the exemption removes discriminatory conditions for domestic producers and for the first time in many years creates conditions for fair competition.
Dozens of business associations and individual companies publicly call for taxation of cheap imports. These are hundreds of companies and tens of thousands of their employees.
The existence of the current tax-free threshold encourages the use of international postal shipments to minimize tax payments. Large consignments of goods are imported using parcel-splitting schemes.
Of course, this is also part of the Ukrainian Government’s efforts to de-shadow the economy, which is the basis of our cooperation programs with the EU and the IMF. Ukraine is moving toward the model of taxing small postal shipments that is already used in the European Union.
Attention! As Serhiy Marchenko says, this reform will provide about 10 billion hryvnias in additional annual budget revenues. This is an additional resource that will be directed exclusively to Ukraine’s defense needs.
How will abolishing the tax exemptions affect Ukrainian business?
A large number of Ukrainian entrepreneurs purchase goods abroad. Has the Ministry of Finance assessed how the new rules will affect small and medium-sized businesses? Is there a risk that for some entrepreneurs this will mean reduced activity or even business closure, especially during the war?
It is precisely Ukrainian businesses that most need fair rules of competition today.
Ukrainian enterprises pay VAT, create jobs, and invest in production even under such difficult conditions as today. At the same time, a large share of similar goods sold through foreign marketplaces benefits from the tax exemption. This creates unequal competitive conditions and honest Ukrainian businesses effectively have worse starting conditions.
If a business model is built on importing commercial goods disguised as small personal purchases up to 150 euros without paying VAT, such enterprises will be forced to restructure their processes.
How will taxing all parcels affect Ukrainians?
Many Ukrainians order goods from abroad because it’s cheaper than buying equivalent goods in Ukraine. Won’t the new system worsen the situation for such people?
Introducing VAT for goods purchased on marketplaces will not necessarily lead to a proportional increase in the final price for consumers. The final price will depend on the policy of a specific marketplace and seller, discounts, logistics, the competitive environment, and so on.
A seller can partially absorb the tax from their margin, change the base price, add discounts, etc.
The reform aims to replace some products with Ukrainian equivalents that previously were not economically feasible to produce and sell. Increasing supply through Ukrainian offerings can also help balance prices.
As part of the reform, the Ministry of Finance will introduce a mechanism — IOSS, Import One-Stop Shop, which works successfully in the EU. For the buyer the process of ordering and receiving goods does not change: a person buys an item on an international marketplace, and during checkout immediately sees its final price including VAT and pays everything in a single payment. The electronic platform then administers the tax and ensures its transfer to the budget. So citizens will not need to calculate VAT themselves, submit additional documents, or pay the tax separately. From the user’s perspective the purchase process does not change.
Important! The minister emphasizes that the system launch is planned no earlier than 1 January 2027 and only after confirming the readiness of all participants in the postal market and implementing the necessary IT solutions. The new rules will come into force only when the system is ready.
Won’t taxing all international parcels lead to Ukrainian sellers facing less competition from Amazon, Temu, or AliExpress and being able to raise prices? How does the state plan to protect consumers from such a scenario?
This is not about restricting competition.
Major international marketplaces will continue to operate in the Ukrainian market. Only one thing changes — all sellers will operate under the same tax rules.
It is fundamentally important that businesses compete with international platforms on quality, service, and efficiency, not on different tax regimes.
The EU’s experience regarding competition and the number of shipments is illustrative. After the VAT exemption for cheap imported goods was abolished in 2021, supply did not decrease. According to the European Commission, in 2024 about 4,6 billion goods in shipments valued up to 150 euros arrived in the EU, and in 2025 — nearly 5,9 billion. Establishing uniform VAT rules does not cut people off from access to international e-commerce and does not stop its development.
In addition, in the EU since 2021 VAT has been paid on all commercial goods purchased from outside the European Union regardless of their value. And since 1 July 2026 the EU also abolished the customs exemption for goods in shipments up to 150 euros and introduced a temporary duty of 3 euros on goods imported into the EU to ensure equal competitive conditions for European businesses.
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "20% ПДВ буде на всі посилки: Марченко розкрив, навіщо уряд хоче змінити правила". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: Channel 24.
