Export with Google Shopping
Selling and shipping to different countries, languages, and currencies can be logistically complex, and requires you to balance different consumer expectations.
Shopping offers several features to help support global advertising, such as automatic currency conversion in case you can’t or don’t want to provide product prices in a foreign currency.
This article explains the requirements that you’ll need to meet in order for you to advertise on Google Shopping in countries different from your home country.
Use the right language and currency
Target country currency, local language
Your ads will show in:
- The language of your target country
- The currency of your target country
Target country currency, supported language
Your ads will show in:
- A language of your choice
- The currency of your target country
Currency not native to the target country, local or supported language
Your ads will show in:
- A language of your choice
- Both a currency of your choice and the currency of your target country (automatically converted by Google).
Distinguish between shipping, tax, and import and export costs
Tax (in Google Shopping) is restricted to two concepts: value-added tax (generally called VAT, IVA, TVA, MWST or GST in different countries) and sales tax. Value-added tax is used in most countries in the world, and sales tax is used in the US. Different countries have different requirements for where and how to submit tax information. Learn more about tax settings
Shipping covers the cost charged by a shipping carrier or other cost directly related to shipping. A charge is classified as a shipping cost if it’s described using the following terms: handling, delivery, shipping, logistics, or carrier. Shipping can include cross-border charges if the cost is included under a shipping term on your website. Shipping should also include insurance costs related to any of the five terms above.
Import or export charges cover costs that are charged in direct connection with products crossing a border. Often this is referred to as duty, excise, or customs, but can also include storage cost, special handling fees, or other costs. Some countries also charge a luxury tax or product specific tax for certain imports. These types of charges don’t fall under the tax category, but are considered an import or export charge.
Follow the correct tax policies
Taxation works differently between countries. Depending on which countries are the origin and the destination, a number of different tax scenarios can occur. Today, you must not include tax in the product price in the US, CA, and IN. In all other countries, tax must be included in the product price.
Included tax vs. excluded tax using target country currency
If you sell to a country with tax inclusion policies different than those in the country you sell from, consumer expectations may be different than what you’re used to. In this case, you’ll need to adjust your tax practices. Since you're using the currency of the target country, you need to follow the price and tax requirements of the target country.
In Germany, tax is included in product prices. In Canada, tax is not included. A merchant based in Germany that exports to Canada in target country currency must not include any tax in their product prices. In Canada, merchants must also not submit any tax in the tax attribute. In case the merchant does charge tax in Canada, they can say so on their landing or checkout pages.
Included tax vs. excluded tax using currency conversion
If you use currency conversion, consumers can assume that you are not a local advertiser. As such, you have to follow the price and tax requirements for the country that matches your chosen currency.
If a merchant exports to Australia in USD, Australian customers are able to identify the merchant’s location by the currency in the ad. The merchant must follow US sales tax rules in their product data and on their website. The tax attribute should be used in place of the price attribute to submit tax information. Since Australian consumers expect taxes to be included in prices, ads show a “+tax” annotation to indicate to users that tax is not included in the price.
If you sell from one country that includes tax in prices into another, it is likely that the VAT rates are different. You must include tax in your product prices. In case you use the target country currency, you can choose to include the tax rate you use on your website. If you use currency conversion, you should use the VAT rate from the country of your chosen currency.
If a French retailer (VAT rate 20%) = exports to Sweden (VAT rate 25%) they can choose to include either 20% or 25% in the product price as long as it matches both the landing page and the checkout pages on their website.
Clearly label import and export costs
Based on how you operate, you may display import and export charges on your checkout page separately, combine them into a single line item, or combine some of them with existing shipping costs.
For example, some shipping providers offer to handle certain customs operations for you, which you may want to include under shipping. To make sure that consumers can connect information they see on Google with the information that they see on your website, you must clearly label the relevant costs and submit information in your product data accordingly. The only product attribute that can contain import or export charges is the shipping attribute. Never submit import and export charges as part of the tax or price attributes.
Example
Your shipping provider handles customs clearance, but you still charge import duties yourself. On your checkout page you have a “shipping and customs” charge and an “import duty” charge. You should submit shipping cost that includes customs clearance charges and match the “shipping and customs” charge on your checkout page. The import duty charge needs to be displayed on the checkout page but does not need to get submitted to Google Shopping.
Follow landing page requirements
If you use any IP detection technology on your website to dynamically change what a user sees, you should submit links to stable landing pages to Google Shopping. Often this is possible by adding specific parameters to the URL that you submit in the link attribute. You may need to make changes to the way your website processes links. Learn more about submitting stable landing pages