Indonesia’s customs office has been under fire this past week thanks to a few cases going viral.
First case was someone being charged 3x the value of the shoes he bought online. Customs said because there was a mistake in item value entered into the system by the sender (under invoicing) the recipient is now liable for the $1800 fine.
Second was a toy influencer receiving their self transforming Megatron toy two weeks late, damaged box, opened by customs, and being given a runaround by the customs office. He was supposed to be part of a global unboxing event last week. A special staff to the finance ministry responded on X but he got piled on due to bureaucratic speak and evasive responses. Customs also charged him based on the price for the Grimlock model which is twice as much.
Third one, prototype equipments for a special needs school given by a South Korean company has been held by customs since 2022 because the school hadn’t paid the import tax bill totaling more than $6,000. There’s no price available online because it’s a prototype so the office decided the value on their own. The school got tired of explaining and gave up in January 2023. Finance Minister made a statement on Instagram yesterday on expediting the process and dropping all fees.
All of these cases were resolved only after they went viral on X.