AFIP updates restriction on personal items allowed through customs - at last!

Following the issuance of Resolución General 4315, AFIP announced that each passenger is allowed to bring with him/her one notebook or tablet and one mobile phone without having to declare it.

I am still not happy that I have to pick between my notebook and my tablet - I like to watch movies from my iPad when traveling, but I can live without it. However, it seems like another already-old update like the SUBE top up device. Can't they simply do things once and do them right?

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[omissis - where it presents current laws regulating the issue]

Que la mencionada Decisión -incorporada como Anexo de la Resolución General N° 2.731- definió como equipaje a los efectos nuevos o usados que un viajero, en consideración a las circunstancias de su viaje, pudiere destinar para su uso o consumo personal o bien para ser obsequiados, siempre que por su cantidad, naturaleza o variedad no permitieren presumir que se importan o exportan con fines comerciales o industriales, especificando que los efectos de uso o consumo personal son los artículos de vestir y aseo, y los demás que tengan manifiestamente carácter personal.

Que, en virtud de lo expuesto y teniendo en consideración las necesidades de globalización y dela era digital, resulta necesario actualizar el alcance del concepto “efectos de uso o consumo personal” contenido en la Resolución N° 3.751/94 (ANA), sus modificatorias y sus complementarias, con el objeto de incorporar aquellos efectos tecnológicos de uso común por viajeros como incidencia de viaje.

[omissis - where it outlines the update to the law]

“4. Efectos de uso o consumo personal: Los artículos de vestir y aseo, y los demás bienes que tengan

manifiestamente carácter personal, incluyendo una computadora portátil que no requiera para su funcionamiento

fuente exterior de energía (tipo notebook o tablet) y un teléfono celular.”.

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I am also confused because La Nación saysyou can bring a notebook, a tablet and a mobile phone (3 items), whereas the laws says two, in my understanding.

It also says that you can bring them as a gift, but they would count, then? I.e. I can't bring my own smartphone and a new one for my husband.

And about the infamous AFIP BUTTON, it also add that if the light turns green, you should be going out straight away, whereas if it turns red, they will scan your bags. However when I got the green light they scanned by bag, and the guy in front of me who got the red light, they made him open his cardboard boxes and bags.

Clarín has a different take on the subject.

First it agrees with my interpretation of max two items, but then adds:

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Los voceros de la entidad de recaudación explicaron que los equipos adquiridos en el extranjero gozarán de la exención impositiva sin importar que se haya salido del país con otros similares encima. Quien egresa del territorio nacional con su propia notebook y/o con una laptop laboral y su propio celular, podrá traer un celular más y una computadora más sin necesidad de declaración ni de pago de tasas por los equipos nuevos.

The question is: so you should still declare your items when you are leaving the country, so that you can come back with one more of each device?

Edited on 10/02: YES.

AFIP will soon launch an app to make your Declaración Jurada more easily. However, I am very puzzled about the new law. I read the old and the news and these details Clarín states do not come from the law, but from "los voceros de AFIP". I guess the AFIP officer at EZE won't let me show him the Clarín article as a proof of the law.

Some useful Q&A on AFIP's page: https://serviciosweb.afip.gob.…/VerGacetilla.aspx?id=475

If you declare your electronics when leaving, you can come back with these plus one new smartphone + one new notebook OR one tablet (2 new items in total), tax free. They can also be sealed items.

The declaration can be made at the airport using the paper form OM-121 or through AFIP's website (and soon through their app).

Quote from Splinter

I'd hardly call that progress, it's still $300.

Sure it is still a laughable amount, but at least now personal items & clothes and those +2 news + 2 old electronics do not add up to that amount. That's quite a progress. In the Q&A it also says that toys do not count, as well. A French couple of expats I know, coming back from their holidays time in their native France, had to pay for their children's toys still boxed. Their daughters simply put the toys in the boxes to bring them safely here, but at Ezeiza they were asked to pay. They were outraged and ignored completely these duties, so they were naïve, but I also think that taxing toys is very miserable of AFIP. Clearly these were not for resale and one for each type.

Looking at the infographic, it is curious to note that if coming by river, there is no franquicia on freeshops purchases, but coming by sea there is. Now, technically, when you sail on a Buquebus tu Uruguay, you are crossing a river.

Too many rules, too many SILLY rules anyway...