Question 1

What is Stipendia?

Accepted Answer

Stipendia is a cross-border customs and tariff payment automation platform. We automate the classification, calculation, collection, and remittance of customs duties and taxes for postal operators, logistics companies, e-commerce retailers, and marketplaces.

Question 2

Who is Stipendia built for?

Accepted Answer

Our primary customers are national postal administrations, international logistics carriers, e-commerce platforms, and marketplaces that need to process cross-border duties at scale. We also support individual merchants via our embeddable checkout widget.

Question 3

What products does Stipendia offer?

Accepted Answer

Four products that work on their own or together: the Stipendia Gateway API (HS classification, landed-cost, screening, and payment endpoints), the embeddable Stipendia Checkout widget, the Stipendia Prepay app for US de minimis pre-payment, and the ITMATT Bridge for postal data exchange.

Question 4

Is there a mobile app for shoppers?

Accepted Answer

Yes — Stipendia Prepay (iOS, Android, and web) lets shoppers pre-pay US duties and taxes before a parcel ships. Enter the item details, get an instant AI HS classification and duty calculation, pay by card, and receive a Declaration ID and QR code to present at the postal counter.

Question 5

What countries does Stipendia cover?

Accepted Answer

Stipendia covers 200+ countries for landed cost calculation, HS classification, and goods screening. Our de minimis and tariff databases are maintained for all major trade corridors including US, EU, UK, Canada, Australia, Japan, and 190+ more.

Question 6

Is there a free trial?

Accepted Answer

Yes — sign up for free and connect to our test API environment at apitest.stipendia.ai/api/v1. No credit card is required to start. Full production access is available after onboarding.

Question 7

What happened to the US de minimis threshold?

Accepted Answer

The US $800 de minimis threshold was effectively suspended under Executive Order 14324, effective August 29, 2025. All items entering the US now require tariff collection regardless of value. This affects 1.4 billion parcels annually. Stipendia’s platform is built to operate under the Qualified Party framework for tax payback under this regime.

Question 8

What is HS classification?

Accepted Answer

The Harmonised System (HS) is an international classification system for goods, maintained by the World Customs Organisation (WCO). A 6-digit HS code identifies a product category for tariff purposes. Stipendia's AI engine classifies goods in 134 input languages and outputs 6, 8, 10, or 12-digit codes depending on destination requirements.

Question 9

What is a landed cost?

Accepted Answer

Landed cost is the total cost to get a product from origin to destination — including the item price, shipping, insurance, import duties, VAT/GST, and any applicable fees. Stipendia calculates the full landed cost for any country pair using real tariff and trade agreement data.

Question 10

What is the difference between DDP and DDU?

Accepted Answer

DDP (Delivered Duty Paid) means the sender pays all duties and taxes before delivery — the recipient receives the parcel without any additional charges. DDU (Delivery Duty Unpaid) means duties are collected from the recipient at or after delivery, typically via a notification from the carrier or postal operator.

Question 11

What is ITMATT and PTC326?

Accepted Answer

ITMATT is the UPU (Universal Postal Union) standard for electronic customs data exchange between postal operators. PTC326 is the UPU technical specification governing ITMATT message formats. Stipendia’s ITMATT Bridge is built to UPU ITMATT & CN23 standards and is fully PTC326 compliant.

Question 12

What is Section 321?

Accepted Answer

Section 321 is the US customs provision that previously allowed goods under $800 to enter duty-free (the "de minimis" rule). Following EO 14324, this exemption has been suspended and Stipendia supports the new duty collection workflow including MPF (Merchandise Processing Fee at 1.4%, minimum $1.00) and ACE eBond submissions.

Question 13

How does the HS Classification AI work?

Accepted Answer

Our HS classification engine is a custom large language model trained on WCO tariff schedules, customs rulings, and trade data. You submit a product description in any of 134 languages and receive an HS code with confidence score, chapter heading, and applicable notes. Batch classification supports thousands of items per request.

Question 14

Can I integrate Stipendia with Shopify or WooCommerce?

Accepted Answer

Yes — Stipendia Checkout is a drop-in embeddable widget that works on Shopify, WooCommerce, WordPress, and any website via a single embed.js script. It calculates duties and VAT at checkout and collects the total landed cost from the buyer via Stripe or Payment Gateway 2, with no backend changes required. Native integrations for additional platforms (BigCommerce, Amazon, Etsy, and more) are on the roadmap.

Question 15

Can I match the checkout to my brand?

Accepted Answer

Yes — the embeddable checkout supports per-merchant branding, including your accent colour and business display name, so the duty-payment step looks like part of your own store rather than a generic third-party page.

Question 16

Does Stipendia handle shipping labels and carrier rates?

Accepted Answer

Yes — alongside duty calculation, Stipendia can generate compliant shipping labels and customs documents (CN23, commercial invoice). Where carrier accounts are configured, it also returns live multi-carrier shipping rates and tracking, so you can price, label, and ship in one flow.

Question 17

What payment methods are supported?

Accepted Answer

We support cards (Visa, Mastercard, Amex) via Stripe, and a wide range of Asian payment methods including Alipay, WeChat Pay, DANA, GCash, TrueMoney, and more via Payment Gateway 2. SEPA bank transfer is supported for EU merchants, and duties can also be collected in person at a post office counter by card or cash.

Question 18

Can shoppers pay duties at a post office counter?

Accepted Answer

Yes — the Post Office Counter flow lets postal staff collect duty and tax payments in person by card or cash. The teller signs in with a PIN, takes the payment, and Stipendia records the transaction, remits it via the clearing bank, and exchanges the ITMATT customs data automatically.

Question 19

Is there a sandbox/test environment?

Accepted Answer

Yes — our test API is live at apitest.stipendia.ai/api/v1 and the test dashboard at ddptest.stipendia.ai. All endpoints are available in the test environment with simulated payment flows and classification responses.

Question 20

What API authentication is used?

Accepted Answer

Stipendia uses API keys with scoped permissions (classify:read, classify:write, screen:read, etc.) for programmatic access. For the merchant dashboard, authentication is handled via Clerk. JWT tokens issued by Clerk are validated on the backend.

Question 21

Does Stipendia support bulk processing?

Accepted Answer

Yes — the bulk upload endpoint supports CSV files with 100,000+ rows, processed asynchronously with chunked deduplication. You can monitor job status (pending, processing, completed, failed) via the job status endpoint or the dashboard.

Question 22

How does Stipendia pricing work?

Accepted Answer

Stipendia offers per-transaction pricing for DDU and DDP flows, and custom volume pricing for hosted and white-label deployments. Individual API modules can also be licensed separately. Contact us for enterprise pricing.

Question 23

What does the DDU model cost?

Accepted Answer

DDU pricing is $1.95 + 8% of the duty and tax handled, per completed transaction, charged to the consignee (parcel recipient). Postal operators and carriers pass the Stipendia fee through as part of their duty collection service.

Question 24

What does the DDP model cost?

Accepted Answer

Merchant DDP starts at $1.95 per order plus 10% of the duty and tax, with no subscription — and you can buy the rate down to $0.50 + 4% on our Scale plan. The fee is charged to the merchant; the full landed cost is presented to the buyer at checkout.

Question 25

Are there additional fees for international duty settlement?

Accepted Answer

Settlement is handled via our clearing partner at competitive rates that depend on currency, corridor, and volume. Volume pricing is available for high-volume postal and logistics clients.

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