Micro-import: calculating your cost price and setting your selling price

In micro-import, the price paid to the supplier is only part of the cost. Between the purchase in foreign currency and the sale in dinars come the exchange rate actually obtained, the duties and taxes on entry, the plane ticket, accommodation, luggage, and then the flat tax on each sale. By the end of this guide, you will know how to calculate the cost price of every item in a trip, allocate shared costs, set a selling price that leaves a margin, and keep within the caps set by executive decree 25-170.

The components of the cost price

The cost price of an imported item is made up of four elements:

1. The purchase price in foreign currency, as shown on the supplier's invoice or receipt.
2. The exchange rate actually obtained, not the rate displayed or hoped for before departure. A difference of 5 DZD per euro on 2,400 EUR of purchases amounts to 12,000 DZD.
3. Duties and taxes on entry, paid under the regime set by the decree. MyHissab shows, for the whole trip, an indicative estimate of duties at 5 % of the imported value; the actual amount is not entered in the application: take the figure from the customs document for your calculations (and record it as an expense). The exact amount depends on the nature of the goods, and the customs document prevails.
4. Transport and trip costs: ticket, accommodation, local transport, excess luggage. These costs are shared by the whole trip and must be allocated across the items.

A fifth element comes into play at the sale, not at the purchase: the single flat tax (IFU) of 0.5 % of turnover. It is calculated on the selling price, not on the margin, and trip costs do not reduce it. It is therefore deducted from the gain, item by item, as explained in the guide on the IFU.

Allocating trip costs

Trip costs concern all the items at once. Two allocation methods are possible; what matters is to choose one and stick to it.

Allocation per unit looks simpler, but it penalises small items: a piece bought for 6 EUR then carries as much cost as a piece bought for 40 EUR, which can wipe out its margin. For a trip mixing expensive and cheap products, allocation in proportion to value gives a more faithful cost price. If an item takes up a disproportionate share of the luggage (volume, weight), nothing prevents you from assigning it a larger share of the costs, provided you note it.

Full example: one trip, three items

Sara Benali, a designer in Oran, makes a buying trip. She obtained a rate of 240 DZD for 1 EUR. Her trip costs come to 96,000 DZD (ticket 60,000 DZD, two nights' accommodation 20,000 DZD, local transport and excess luggage 16,000 DZD). She uses an estimate of 5 % duties pending the customs document and allocates costs in proportion to purchase value. The calculation that follows is done outside the application, in a spreadsheet: MyHissab only provides the cost of each item converted into dinars.

Costs are allocated according to each item's weight in the purchases: the handbags account for 240,000 / 576,000, or 41.67 % of purchases, and therefore receive 41.67 % of 96,000 DZD, that is 40,000 DZD. The same calculation gives 32,000 DZD for the shoes and 24,000 DZD for the wallets.

Sara then sets her selling prices and calculates the margin, after deducting the 0.5 % IFU on each sale:

If everything sells at the planned price, the trip generates 960,000 DZD of turnover, 4,800 DZD of IFU and 254,400 DZD of net gain, for 700,800 DZD invested. With allocation per unit (96,000 DZD / 160 pieces = 600 DZD per piece), a wallet would cost 2,112 DZD instead of 1,752 DZD and would leave only 475 DZD of margin at the same price: a concrete illustration of the effect of the method chosen.

Keeping within the decree's caps

Executive decree no. 25-170 of June 28, 2025 sets a maximum value of goods of 1,800,000 DZD per trip and no more than two trips per month. The value to compare against the cap is that of the goods, converted into dinars: in the example, 576,000 DZD, well below the limit. Sara can make a second trip in the same month, not a third.

The annual cap for the field, 10,000,000 DZD of turnover over the calendar year, is monitored at the level of sales, not purchases. A trip like the one in the example represents 960,000 DZD of turnover: about ten trips of this size are enough to approach the limit. The guide on the auto-entrepreneur cap details the difference between invoiced and collected turnover; remember that both deserve to be tracked, one for the cap, the other for the IFU.

Splitting a trip across several people to exceed the value per trip, or importing on behalf of a third-party trader, is not permitted by the decree.

Setting the price: target margin and psychological price

Once the cost price is known, two approaches complement each other.

The target margin. Decide what share of the selling price should remain as margin, then calculate the price: selling price = cost price / (1 − target margin − 0.005). For a handbag at 7,300 DZD and a target margin of 25 % of the price, the calculation gives 7,300 / 0.745 = 9,799 DZD. Never set a price on the purchase price in foreign currency alone: an item bought for 25 EUR "is worth" 7,300 DZD, not 6,000 DZD.

The psychological price. The market has its reference points: 9,900 DZD or 10,000 DZD are easier to remember than 9,799 DZD. Round up when the margin allows it, never below the cost price. Also compare with the prices charged locally for the same type of item: a price that is too high slows turnover, a price that is too low wastes the margin you have already financed through the trip.

Unsold stock and stock turnover

The total margin in the table assumes that everything sells at the planned price. In practice, part of the stock moves more slowly or at a reduced price. If Sara sells 30 handbags at 10,000 DZD and has to clear the last 10 at 7,400 DZD, her margin on the handbags drops to 79,500 DZD + 630 DZD = 80,130 DZD instead of 106,000 DZD. Every piece sold below its cost price is a dead loss, because the trip costs and duties have already been paid.

Three habits limit this risk:

• Record the date of each sale to measure how many weeks an item takes to sell; an item that takes three months to move ties up the money for the next trip.
• Set a clearance threshold for each item in advance, above the cost price, rather than slashing prices in a hurry.
• Reduce the quantities of slow-moving items on the next trip, even if their unit margin is attractive.

Trip costs are real expenses that are not deducted from the IFU; they do count, however, in your real margin, as explained in the guide on expenses and real margin. For tracking remaining quantities and low-stock thresholds, see the guide on stock and batches.

What MyHissab calculates for you

The Micro-import module follows the method in this guide:

• each trip receives a number (VOY-2026-0007), a currency and an exchange rate that you enter;
• each item has its unit cost converted into dinars (price in foreign currency × the rate entered); duties, trip costs and their allocation are calculated outside the application, as in the example above (the application only shows an indicative estimate of duties at 5 % for the whole trip);
• the quantity sold and the "Realized profit" (selling price minus converted cost, before duties, costs and IFU) update with each sale recorded;
• a progress bar turns orange at 80 % of the 1,800,000 DZD cap and an alert appears if it is exceeded; when a third trip is created in the month, a warning recalls the limit of two, without ever blocking data entry;
• the dashboard tracks the year's turnover against the 10,000,000 DZD cap, with a signal at 80 % and then at 100 %.

Common mistakes

• Using the exchange rate on the day of the calculation instead of the rate actually obtained when buying the currency.
• Forgetting trip costs or treating them as a "separate" expense that does not go into the price.
• Keeping the 5% estimate in your calculations once the customs document is in hand.
• Calculating the IFU on the margin: it applies to turnover, and therefore to the entire selling price.
• Setting a price from the purchase price in foreign currency multiplied by a rough coefficient.
• Confusing the caps: 1,800,000 DZD applies to the value of goods per trip, 10,000,000 DZD to the year's turnover.

Frequently asked questions

Should you include your own meals and personal expenses in the trip costs? The simplest approach is to count only the costs needed to buy and transport the goods (ticket, accommodation, luggage, local transport). Personal expenses artificially inflate the cost price and distort comparisons between trips.

What if the duties actually paid differ from the 5 % estimate? MyHissab shows, for the whole trip, an indicative estimate of duties at 5 % of the imported value; the actual amount is not entered in the application. Take the figure from the customs document for your calculations, item by item if necessary, recalculate the cost price before setting or adjusting prices, and record it as an expense. The customs document is the only reference.

Is an item still unsold after several months a loss? Not as long as it is not sold below its cost price. However, the money it ties up is missing for the next trip: it is better to clear it slightly above cost price than to keep it for a year.