Bringing Your Belongings to Barbados
Answer
The general rule applies to you
No exception is recorded for citizens of Jamaica on this topic. That is the answer, not a gap - everything below is the rule you get, unchanged.
91 exceptions recorded across 34 countries · none match Jamaica to Barbados · Bringing your belongings
The Customs Act handles a person's own things through the definition of passengers' baggage: commercial travellers' samples, and otherwise the personal or household effects of the passenger and his family plus small articles brought as declared gifts, but nothing intended for sale or exchange. Baggage so defined is kept outside several of the Act's ordinary requirements - it need not be entered before export, it is not caught by the rules on goods not reported on arrival, and the loading of it is permitted at the proper officer's discretion. For a vehicle or other goods brought temporarily, section 111 allows importation against a deposit or security, and section 112 requires export within three months unless the proper officer is satisfied the goods are the bona fide property or in the bona fide use of a person on a temporary visit, in which case he may allow longer.
At a glance
- What counts as baggage
- The personal or household effects of the passenger and his family, and small articles imported as declared gifts
- What does not
- Any articles intended for sale or exchange
- Temporary importation period
- 3 months from the date of the permission
- Extension for a temporary visitor
- At the proper officer's discretion, on additional security where he requires it, where the goods are the bona fide property or in the bona fide use of a person on a temporary visit
- Vehicle weight certificate fee for a short visit
- Not payable by a person visiting for a period not exceeding 3 months who brought the vehicle for his own use, on producing the manufacturer's weight certificate
Road Traffic Act section 27(3), inserted by Act 1998-34. This is the weighing certificate fee, not registration or duty.
- Duty concession for a returning national or a new immigrant
- Not found in any instrument we read
Requirements
- A declaration of what you are bringing - small articles imported as gifts must be duly declared as such
- Nothing in the baggage intended for sale or exchange, or it is not baggage
- For goods brought in temporarily: a deposit with the proper officer or security, and export within three months unless an extension is allowed
In detail
Baggage is defined by intention
The Customs Act does not set an allowance by value or by weight for personal effects. It defines passengers' baggage and then treats what falls inside that definition differently from other goods. Commercial travellers' samples are in. Personal or household effects of the passenger and family are in. Small articles brought as gifts are in, if declared. Anything intended for sale or exchange is out, and so is anything that is not an effect of the passenger or the family. The consequences run through the Act: section 49 excepts baggage from the rule on goods not reported on arrival, section 62 excepts it from the requirement to make an entry, and section 77 lets the proper officer permit its loading.
Bringing something temporarily
Section 111 lets the proper officer permit goods to be imported against a deposit or security instead of duty, and section 112 gives three months to export them before the deposit is taken as duty. The proviso is the part a visitor needs: the officer may allow an additional period, on further security if he wants it, where he is satisfied the goods are the bona fide property of, or bona fide in the use of, a person on a temporary visit to Barbados. A visitor who brings a car has a parallel concession in the Road Traffic Act, which excuses the weight certificate fee for a visit of not more than three months where the vehicle was brought for the visitor's own use.
Country-level policy
Barbados publishes its law in three places that do not agree with each other about how current it is, and none of them says so on its face. The Supreme Court's statute library carries the Chapters, printed by the Government Printer, with a Law Revision Order year in the running head of each page - 2007 on the newest pages of the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act, 1997 on the Income Tax pages that carry the residence and domicile rules. The Attorney General's Office carries annual Acts and statutory instruments, and its series of annual Acts stops at 2020. The Government Printing Department publishes the Official Gazette, which is where an Act of 2021 or later is actually found. A reader looking for the law in force has to use all three, and an amendment made between 2021 and today is invisible in the first two.
What applies to you
Nothing changes for a citizen of Jamaica
We have no rule recorded that treats your citizenship differently here, so the general rule above is the one that applies to you. That is an answer, not a gap.
What the law says
«passengers’ baggage” includes commercial travellers’ samples, but otherwise does not include any articles intended for sale or exchange or any articles other than the personal or household effects of the passenger and his family»The definition continues: and any small articles imported by the passenger as gifts and duly declared as such. The test is intention, so a quantity that looks like stock is the thing to avoid.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
«Where any goods imported under section 111 are not exported
within 3 months of the date of the said permission, the deposit in the
hands of the proper officer shall be brought to account by the proper
officer as duties of customs»The alternative is that the security given is called. If the goods are exported in time the deposit is refunded or the security cancelled.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
«allow any
additional period where he is satisfied that the goods are the bona fide
property or bona fide in the use of any person on a temporary visit to
Barbados.»A discretion, exercised on additional security where the officer requires it. There is no stated maximum.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
«does not apply to any payment made in respect of a motor
vehicle by a person visiting Barbados for a period not exceeding 3 months who
has brought the motor vehicle with him for his own use during his visit, if that
person produces to the Licensing Authority the manufacturer’s weight
certificate of the motor vehicle in respect of which the payment is made.»About this source
The ministry responsible for road traffic law, and the publisher of the only readable and current consolidation of the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295. Its edition incorporates amendments up to Act 2022-21, carries the historical note for each provision in square brackets, and is materially newer than the Chapter in the judiciary's statute library, which is largely a scan.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue. The document lists the Acts it incorporates and the Law Revision Orders behind it but states no date to which it is current, so the last Act named is not a cut-off and must not be recorded as one. It does not publish the subsidiary legislation made under the Act, which is where any visitor driving permit would have to be found, and it does not publish fees.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
Practical notes
We found no instrument granting a duty concession to a returning national, a new immigrant or a permanent resident bringing household effects. That does not mean none exists: such concessions usually sit in the Customs Tariff, which is subsidiary legislation we did not read, and the Barbados Customs and Excise Department's own website would not return a page to us on either attempt.
The figure a traveller actually needs - the value allowance on arrival - is not in the Act and is not stated here.
This record rests on sections 2, 111 and 112 of the Customs Act Chapter 66 and section 27 of the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295. It does not rest on the Customs Tariff or on any Customs Department page.
- consolidatesCustoms Act, Chapter 66 of the Laws of Barbados
Supreme Court of Barbados - Laws of Barbados · consolidated to 2007
About this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
- consolidatesRoad Traffic Act, Chapter 295, consolidated to Act 2022-21
Ministry of Transport and Works of Barbados
About this source
The ministry responsible for road traffic law, and the publisher of the only readable and current consolidation of the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295. Its edition incorporates amendments up to Act 2022-21, carries the historical note for each provision in square brackets, and is materially newer than the Chapter in the judiciary's statute library, which is largely a scan.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue. The document lists the Acts it incorporates and the Law Revision Orders behind it but states no date to which it is current, so the last Act named is not a cut-off and must not be recorded as one. It does not publish the subsidiary legislation made under the Act, which is where any visitor driving permit would have to be found, and it does not publish fees.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source