DDP — Delivered Duty Paid
The seller's maximum obligation: delivered to the destination with import clearance done and duties paid.
- Group
- D — Arrival
- Transport mode
- Any mode, including multimodal.
- Named place
- The destination where the cleared goods are placed at the buyer's disposal.
- Main carriage paid by
- Seller
- Risk passes
- At destination, cleared, ready for unloading
- Export clearance
- Seller
- Import clearance and duties
- Seller
- Seller must insure
- No obligation on either party. Arrange your own cover.
- Unloading at destination
- Buyer.
DDP is the mirror of EXW. The seller bears all costs and risks to the named destination and, uniquely among the eleven, handles import clearance and pays the duties and taxes. Delivery is on the arriving vehicle, ready for unloading — DDP does not include unloading any more than DAP does.
The obligation that catches sellers is import clearance. Many countries require the importer of record to be locally established or registered for the destination's VAT or sales tax. A seller who quotes DDP into such a country may find they cannot lawfully perform the role they have just contracted to perform, and that the recoverable import VAT they assumed becomes an unrecoverable cost.
It is genuinely attractive for small parcels and for buyers who want one landed price with nothing to administer. It is a poor default for a first shipment into an unfamiliar jurisdiction.
Check that you can be importer of record in the destination country before quoting DDP, and check whether the import VAT is recoverable by you. Both answers are country-specific, and both are often no.
Always write the rule with its named place and the version — DDP [named place], Incoterms 2020. The rule says nothing about when ownership transfers; that is for your sales contract.