Importing Caps from Sialkot

Get the HS code right on the commercial invoice — customs uses it to assess duty and to route the shipment through the correct compliance channel.

• 6505.00.90: knitted or crocheted caps, and other hats and headgear — knitted, made up from lace, felt or other textile fabric.
• 6505.00.30: caps of cotton (US HTS). Baseball caps of woven cotton twill fall here.
• 6505.00.60: caps of man-made fibres (US HTS). Polyester trucker fronts, tech-fabric running caps.
• 6506.10: safety headgear (helmets) — not for cloth caps.

Duty varies by destination: EU sits around 2.7–12% depending on GSP+ status (Pakistan qualifies for GSP+, reducing duty on most textile lines to 0%); US MFN is 7.5% on cotton caps; UK post-Brexit follows the UK Global Tariff.

The Incoterm decides where the factory's responsibility ends and yours begins. Three cover 95% of Sialkot cap exports.

• EXW (Ex Works): factory gate. Buyer arranges pickup from Sialkot, road haulage to Karachi port and everything downstream. Rare — most buyers don't want to manage inland Pakistan logistics.
• FOB Karachi: factory delivers to Karachi port, clears export customs and loads onto the vessel. Buyer pays sea freight and destination clearance. The standard for programme buys.
• CIF destination: factory pays sea freight and marine insurance to destination port. Buyer pays destination clearance, duty and final-mile. Better for buyers without a freight forwarder relationship.
• DDP: factory pays everything including destination duty. Simple for the buyer, expensive because the factory prices in worst-case duty. Common for e-commerce dropship.

A standard cap export carton holds 48 caps in a 5-ply corrugate box with polybag inners. Carton dimensions are typically 60 × 40 × 40cm at 8–10kg gross.

• 20ft container: ~50 cartons ≈ 2,400 caps. Fills on volume, not weight — cap cartons are light.
• 40ft HC container: ~110 cartons ≈ 5,280 caps. The workhorse for programme buys.
• Air freight: LCL/airfreight priced by chargeable weight (volumetric divisor 1:6000). A 48pc carton chargeable weight is ~16kg regardless of actual weight.
• Carton marking: shipping marks per PO, gross/net weight, dimensions, country of origin, made-in label. Palletisation on request — most Sialkot factories ship floor-loaded.

Every shipment needs a paper trail. Missing one document holds the container at destination port at $150–300/day demurrage.

• Commercial invoice: HS code, unit price FOB, quantity, buyer/seller details, Incoterm.
• Packing list: carton count, dimensions, weights, contents by size and colour.
• Bill of Lading (B/L): issued by shipping line, three originals — one is the title document.
• Certificate of Origin: Form A for GSP+ (EU), FORM E / regional forms for other trade agreements. Issued by Sialkot Chamber of Commerce.
• Country-of-origin label: "Made in Pakistan" stitched into the cap under the sweatband. Not optional — customs can hold for missing labels.

First orders typically run 30% advance / 70% against B/L copy. Repeat buyers negotiate 100% net-30 or LC at sight against documents. Escrow platforms (Alibaba Trade Assurance) work for sample and pilot orders but rarely scale to programme volume.