Updates Spain's smuggling law: new thresholds, penalties and duties

Automatic summary, not yet reviewed

1. The minimum amounts for smuggling to be a crime go up: €150,000 for goods that may be lawfully traded, €50,000 for cases such as defense material, drug precursors or Spanish Historical Heritage, and €15,000 for tobacco. Below those amounts, the conduct is an administrative offense.
2. The crime of smuggling is reorganized by the legal interest protected and can now also be committed through gross negligence. Legal entities can be criminally liable.
3. Penalties are adapted to the Criminal Code: one to five years in prison and a fine of up to six times the value of the goods, with rules for forfeiting goods, transport and profits, and for enforcing the fine and civil liability.
4. Administrative offenses are classified as minor, serious and very serious based on the value of the goods, with proportional fines and, in some cases, closure of establishments. It also regulates when the administrative sanction and the criminal process cannot overlap.
5. Transport companies must send Spanish customs the data of passengers traveling to Spain from outside the EU customs territory before departure. The data must be deleted within ninety days unless an investigation is underway.
6. The tax exemption on tobacco for travelers who are residents and cross-border workers of the border area with Gibraltar and Andorra is reduced to 200 cigarettes per month. The law takes effect the day after publication, except the passenger information duty and the customs facility reform, which take effect one year later.

Who it affects

• People who import, export or trade goods without meeting customs requirements: They may commit the crime or an administrative offense of smuggling depending on the value of the goods.
• Passenger transport companies: They must send passenger data to customs before the means of transport departs.
• Owners or concessionaires of ports, airports and other facilities with a customs facility: They must provide premises and access for customs and inspection services.
• Residents and cross-border workers of the Gibraltar and Andorra border area: The tobacco tax exemption is reduced to 200 cigarettes per month.
• Legal entities and entities without legal personality: They can be criminally liable and face fines, bans or closure.

Words worth knowing

Contrabando (smuggling)

Importing, exporting or trading goods bypassing customs control or without meeting legal requirements.

Comiso (forfeiture)

Loss of goods to the State when they were used in or obtained from the crime.

Géneros estancados (State monopoly goods)

Products whose production or trade is a State monopoly by law, such as tobacco products.

Levante (release of goods)

The act by which customs places declared goods at the disposal of the declarant.

Tanto de culpa (referral to courts)

The referral by the Administration to the courts of facts that may be a crime.

It summarizes the law as published in the BOE. It is written by artificial intelligence and may contain mistakes: the official text is what counts. Read the official text · How we make summaries