This page has been specially designed for businessmen who want to make incursions into the foreign trade for the first time. The majority of the small Argentinian enterprises believe that the possibility to carry out business abroad, are just for those that have a big capital, and only think of this possibility as something hard and difficult to get. This is not true. We will try to explain in a few and simple words the necessary steps to import, including how to calculate the import costs, following the way goods have to cover since they are acquired abroad until they are put into the warehouse.

Secuence of import

Next, we will detail the sequence of an import operation. It goes through the different stages:

• Make contact with the foreign supplier and agree on the purchase
• Contact a custom officer
• Customs Registration
• Make effective the payment for the supplier
• Dispatch to the market place
• Contracting Transportation

Make contact with the foreign supplier and agree on the purchase.

Once the market is analyzed and the decision of importing the product has been taken, you should make contact with the foreign enterprises that may provide it. Nowadays, this kind of information is very easily gotten via Internet and electronic mail.

Usually, the International Contract of sale is carried out through a "Sale certificate"; this one is the acceptance of the "prize" of the supplier.

As regards the prices in the International trade, these may be of different kinds. The most common ones are ExWorks, FOB y CIF. The different prices depend on the experience in foreign trade that both parts have (supplier and buyer).

• Ex Works: t means "in factory" and it means that goods are delivered in the supplier's factory, and the rest of the costs to take them to the buyer's store depend on the buyer.
• FOB: it means, "free in ship", this is to say that the price of goods includes the costs until goods are in the ship in the original port, the rest of the costs depend on the buyer.
• CIF: it means "Cost, Insurance and Transportation", this is to say, the price includes the costs until the charge is in the ship at its destination, the rest of the payment has to do with the movements in the port (this is the price for unloading goods from the ship and load them in a track), custom taxes (nationalizing rights, taxes) and the transportation to the buyer's store.

Taking this into account, you can buy enough goods to fill a container, or part of it (the enterprises that transport goods abroad, have containers to carry smaller volumes of different owners). In this case, an interesting alternative for those who begin in the foreign trade, is the possibility of getting together with some businessmen and form a purchases pool and rent a complete container.