Shipping Household Goods to Thailand

Air freight makes sense for under 100 kg of essential clothing, work documents, or items you need within two weeks. Door-to-door from the US East Coast or Western Europe runs USD 6-12 per kilo with a 100 kg minimum and a 5-7 day transit once the airline accepts the shipment. Bangkok Suvarnabhumi clears air shipments within 2-3 working days if a broker is engaged on arrival. Less-than-container-load (LCL) sea freight is the right choice for one-bedroom apartments and smaller (roughly 5-12 cubic metres). Costs run USD 200-400 per cubic metre from the US or Europe with 30-45 day transit. Full container (20-foot FCL fits a 2-3 bedroom home at around 28 cubic metres) costs USD 4,500-7,500 from major Western ports to Laem Chabang, and beats LCL economics above 15 cubic metres. Door-to-door FCL includes loading, customs, and delivery within Bangkok.

Holders of a one-year non-immigrant visa (work permit, retirement, marriage, LTR, Elite) can import used household goods duty-free under Notification 109/2557. The shipment must arrive within six months of the date you entered Thailand on the qualifying visa, contain only used personal effects, and be declared in advance to Thai Customs. You can import one of each electrical appliance (one TV, one fridge, one washing machine) — anything beyond one of a category is duty-assessed. To claim the allowance you submit your passport, work permit or visa extension, the bill of lading or air waybill, a detailed packing list valued in baht (be honest — undervaluation triggers physical inspection), and a one-page application. Approval takes 3-5 working days at the Customs Bureau in Klong Toei or Suvarnabhumi. Without the allowance, used personal effects still pay 20-30 percent duty plus 7 percent VAT, which on a 12-cubic-metre shipment routinely adds 80,000-150,000 THB to the bill.

Absolute prohibitions include narcotics, e-cigarettes and vape liquids (Thailand bans both, with substantial fines), pornography, fake currency, fake brand goods including replica watches, more than 200 cigarettes or one litre of spirits, and game animals or unprocessed wood not covered by CITES. Restricted items requiring permits include firearms (Police Department licence — virtually never granted to foreigners), prescription medicines beyond 30-day personal supply (FDA permit), drones over 2 kg or with cameras (NBTC registration), radios and transmitters (NBTC), antiques over 100 years old (Fine Arts Department), and CBD or hemp products despite legal ambiguity since the 2025 recriminalisation. Plants and seeds need a Plant Quarantine permit and often fail at inspection. The safest approach is to pre-screen your packing list with the customs broker and remove or pre-permit anything ambiguous.

Engaging a Thai-licensed customs broker is effectively mandatory — direct clearance by individuals takes weeks and rarely succeeds without the duty-free allowance approval letter. Reputable movers like AGS, Asian Tigers, Crown Worldwide, Allied Pickfords, Santa Fe, and Siam Relocation include brokerage in their door-to-door quotes. Standalone broker fees for a self-arranged shipment run 8,000-15,000 THB. The broker submits your packing list to Customs, attends physical inspection if selected (about 1 in 3 shipments), pays any duties and VAT on your behalf, and arranges delivery from port or airport. Build in a contingency of 20,000-40,000 THB for unexpected duties on borderline items, port handling fees if delivery is delayed, and storage charges (around 1,000 THB per cubic metre per week) if you cannot accept delivery immediately. Tipping the inspection officer is illegal and increasingly enforced — refuse any broker who suggests it.