Etsy Tests US Tariff Calculator for Non-US Sellers, But Beta Tool Has Gaps

Etsy is testing a new US Estimated Tariffs Calculator for non-US sellers, but the early version appears to be more of a pricing guide than a fully integrated solution for handling duties on US-bound orders.

The new feature was spotted by Canada-based seller and ecommerce consultant, Cindy Baldassi, who posted a full breakdown including screenshots on her Patreon.

According to Baldassi, when creating or editing a listing, sellers who have access to the new tool will see a new section that says "estimate US tariff costs" under the "Pricing & Shipping" tab below the Attribute section.

Sellers are then asked to fill out a brief description of the item, the price and the country of origin. From there, Etsy will suggest the HS code for the item and display estimated tariff costs which come from their integration with Zonos.

However, the tool isn't yet further integrated into the listing process - for now it's merely a suggestion to help guide the seller in determining how much to add to their US-specific item pricing, which still needs to be entered manually.

Per the Etsy help page about the new feature:

You can use the US estimated tariffs calculator when creating or editing listings to estimate US duties and taxes and identify potential HS codes. Use these estimates to help inform your pricing for items being shipped to the US and ship with Delivered Duty Paid (DDP) to help buyers avoid surprises at delivery.

Of course when sellers ship DDP and simply bake duty costs into the item price, Etsy benefits both in terms of fee calculations and a boost to Gross Merchandise Sales (GMS) in quarterly earnings reports.

Surprisingly, a survey asking sellers what they think of the new feature indicates that Etsy may at least be considering a solution that would allow sellers to include itemized tariff costs - with fees not applied.

Baldassi was astonished that Etsy would even include that option in the survey, while also wondering if Etsy might make the new feature part of a paid shop subscription to offset some of the potential fee loss.

Would I want a way to charge tariffs without paying Etsy fees on them? Yes, please! This is not what non-US sellers usually expect from Etsy.

Remember, the corporation won't even let non-US sellers charge taxes correctly, and they do take fees from those tax-related increases to our listing prices.

That they are asking about building useful tools that would also decrease fees is honestly quite astonishing. Or, maybe they are just going to make these types of options part of a shop subscription tier such as Etsy Plus, and get their money back that way.

She also says it appears the feature does not currently work for variation listings, but hopefully that will change as Etsy continues to roll it out to more sellers and adds more functionality.

Have you seen the new US Estimated Tariffs Calculator when creating or editing your Etsy listings? Let us know in the comments below!