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Goods Description requirements for International Shipments
Goods Description requirements for International Shipments

How to ensure your international deliveries don't get rejected, and reach customers fast.

Nathan Huppatz avatar
Written by Nathan Huppatz
Updated over a week ago

International Shipments have different requirements from domestic shipments.

They benefit from extra information in the order to ensure safe fast delivery.

Some countries and regions like the EU now require more accurate Goods Descriptions or orders may be turned away at the border.

One of these pieces of information helps with customs clearance and duty calculation, and this field is the Goods Description field.

Important : Goods Description must contain an accurate description of the goods/item being shipped.

It should not be a generic term.

By default, our app will use the Item Title as the Goods Description component, when the default Carrier setting is blank (see below).

You may override this if you wish, see below.

Shipping guidelines for the EU may help you work out a good description for an item.

This information from DHL provides some examples of what is and isn't acceptable.

Where to set your Goods Description

Default value per Store

ReadytoShip allows you to set a default value of 'Goods Description for International Consignments' in each of your Carrier settings.

This value, when set, is automatically applied to each and every SKU that is imported in an order into our system.

(Leaving this option blank/empty will force our app to use the Item/SKU Title as the Goods Description)

To change this, go to Settings > Carriers and edit the store settings

Value per SKU

You can also set a unique Goods Description per SKU. Expand an International order, and edit the Goods Description by clicking on the 'world' icon next to each line item in the order.

If you have questions about what appropriate values should be used, these should be directed to your Carrier account manager or support team.

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