Your household goods to Czechia: no customs, and the car that only gets plates after six months' residence

Your household goods go to Czechia without customs. Dutch Customs says so without reservation: whoever moves to another EU country can generally take their belongings along without a declaration in the Netherlands or in the other country. No inventory list, no clearance. Three things do have their own rules: the car, alcohol and tobacco in large quantities, and your animals. The finding is with the car: as an EU citizen you prove residence of at least six months in the calendar year at registration.

Why is there no customs?

Within the EU there is free movement of goods. A move to Czechia therefore requires no declaration, not with Dutch Customs and not in Czechia. That is the big difference with a move to a country outside the EU, where you make an export declaration for your removal goods and hand in an inventory list.

What remains is a transport question: driving yourself, a part load in a shared lorry, or a truck of your own for a whole house. What those options roughly cost is included in the cost estimate for Czechia.

What are the three exceptions?

What	The rule	Deadline, limit or amount
Your car	registration in the Czech register	registration 800 Kč, online 640 Kč; emissions fee 3,000 to 10,000 Kč below Euro 3
Alcohol and tobacco	free for own use, guideline values per type	for example 800 cigarettes, 10 litres of spirits, 90 litres of wine, 110 litres of beer
Pets	chip, rabies vaccination and EU pet passport	first vaccination at least 21 days old

The car: which documents, and which residence?

You register a car from another EU country at a municipal office with extended powers; any of the 206 will do, regardless of where you live. The Ministry of Transport asks for:

• the application form, which you can also submit online via the Transport Portal, with a 20% discount on the fee;
• the foreign registration papers, both parts if the registration certificate has two;
• an inspection report if the foreign papers don't contain all the details;
• valid third-party liability insurance, which the office checks electronically itself;
• and proof of residence in Czechia. For an EU citizen that is proof of temporary residence of at least six months in the calendar year.

The fee for a passenger car is 800 crowns at the counter and 640 crowns with an online application. If the car doesn't meet the Euro 3 standard, you pay an emissions fee at the first registration: 3,000 crowns for Euro 2, 5,000 for Euro 1 and 10,000 if it meets no Euro standard at all.

The residence proof is the bottleneck. The office asks for proof of temporary residence of at least six months in the calendar year. The registration certificate from the Ministry of the Interior is the obvious paper for that, and you only apply for it if you are staying for more than three months. Add the thirteen weeks on the Dutch side: whoever wants bpm back must have the car on Czech plates within thirteen weeks after the RDW registered the status 'Export'. So don't deregister the car for export too early.

How the rest works for the car and for your driving licence is in car and driving licence in Czechia.

Alcohol and tobacco: guideline values, not an allowance

Between EU countries you pay excise duty in the country of purchase, and you don't have to pay anything extra on arrival, as long as it is for your own use. To judge that, each country uses guideline values, which may not be lower than the European ones: 800 cigarettes, 400 cigarillos, 200 cigars, 1 kilo of tobacco, 10 litres of spirits, 20 litres of fortified wine, 90 litres of wine of which at most 60 litres sparkling, and 110 litres of beer. If you are above them, customs can ask you to prove it is for yourself. If you can't, you pay excise duty after all or lose the goods.

The animals: their own rules

Dogs, cats and ferrets travel with a chip, a valid rabies vaccination and the EU pet passport. Czechia also has a central dog register and its own chip requirement; that is covered in your pet to Czechia.

What else do you need to arrange?

The reporting duty. Whoever stays longer than thirty days reports to the Foreign Police within thirty days of entry; see rodné číslo and the reporting duty in Czechia. That clock runs from the border, not from the day the removal van is unloaded.

Medicines. A supply of prescribed medicines has its own rules, also within the EU. They are in medicines across the border.

The order of move, car and registration on your date is in the step-by-step plan for Czechia.

In Vertrekklaar this is phase 3 of 5 of the journey, step 3.1: the same steps, but for your situation — in your order, tickable, and with the deadlines watched. See the whole journey to Czechia or go straight to step 3.1 in the open plan.