Motorcycle or car: how one tariff chapter spans 39.75% to 1,007.5%
Put a motorcycle and a car side by side in the Bangladesh tariff and you learn more about how the country taxes imports than any explanation could teach you. Both are vehicles. Both sit in chapter 87. Both carry 25% customs duty on almost every line.
And yet the total tax on them ranges from 39.75% to 1,007.5% — a spread of nearly a thousand percentage points, driven almost entirely by one column: supplementary duty.
The motorcycle ladder
Heading 8711 covers motorcycles. Customs duty is 25% on virtually every line, so it tells you nothing. Here is what actually decides the bill:
| What you are importing | Example code | SD | TTI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Electric motorcycle | 87116000 | 0% | 39.75% |
| Moped, four-stroke, 50–250cc, CBU | 87112032 | 0% | 64.25% |
| Four-stroke, 50–250cc, CKD | 87112041 | 20% | 96.10% |
| Four-stroke, 50–250cc, CBU | 87112031 | 60% | 159.80% |
| Four-stroke, 251–500cc | 87113010 | 100% | 223.50% |
| Two-stroke, any size | 87112051 | 250% | 462.38% |
Read that table as policy and it becomes obvious. The tariff is saying four things at once:
- Electrify. An electric motorcycle is taxed at 39.75% — the lowest figure in the entire heading, and lower than almost anything else on wheels. Note it also carries CD of only 10% rather than 25%.
- Assemble locally. The same four-stroke machine costs 96.10% as CKD and 159.80% as CBU. That 63-point gap is the assembly industry's protection.
- Keep engines small. Cross 250cc and SD jumps from 60% to 100%.
- Stop importing two-strokes. SD of 250% is not a tax, it is a prohibition with paperwork. Two-stroke engines are a serious urban air-pollution source, and the tariff treats them accordingly.
Worked example: the two-stroke trap
Suppose you import 100 motorcycles with an assessable value of BDT 150,000 each — total BDT 15,000,000.
As four-stroke CBU (87112031, CD 25%, SD 60%, RD 5%, VAT 15%, AT 7.5%, AIT 5%):
| Step | Base (BDT) | Rate | Tax (BDT) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customs Duty | 15,000,000 | 25% | 3,750,000 |
| Regulatory Duty | 15,000,000 | 5% | 750,000 |
| Supplementary Duty | 19,500,000 | 60% | 11,700,000 |
| VAT | 31,200,000 | 15% | 4,680,000 |
| Advance Tax | 31,200,000 | 7.5% | 2,340,000 |
| Advance Income Tax | 15,000,000 | 5% | 750,000 |
| Total tax | 23,970,000 | ||
159.8%, matching the published figure.
The identical consignment classified as two-stroke (87112051, SD 250%) attracts 462.38% — tax of BDT 69,357,000.
That is a difference of BDT 45,387,000 on the same invoice value. The engine type is not a detail. It is the single most expensive fact about the shipment.
Now the cars
Heading 8703 has 282 lines and fourteen distinct TTI figures:
| TTI | Lines | Broadly |
|---|---|---|
| 33.63% | 79 | ambulances and special-purpose vehicles |
| 96.10% | 49 | small engines, some CKD |
| 159.80% | 48 | mid-range |
| 303.13% | 12 | larger engines |
| 621.63% | 10 | large petrol |
| 1,007.5% | 4 | the largest engines |
At the top sits 87032431 with a TTI of 1,007.5%. On an assessable value of BDT 1,000,000 the tax is BDT 10,075,000 and the landed cost around 11,075,000. Supplementary duty alone is about 74% of that bill; customs duty is under 3%.
The comparison that matters
Take BDT 1,000,000 of assessable value and see what you can bring in:
| Vehicle | TTI | Tax (BDT) | Landed (BDT) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Electric motorcycles | 39.75% | 397,500 | 1,397,500 |
| Four-stroke motorcycles, CKD | 96.10% | 961,000 | 1,961,000 |
| Four-stroke motorcycles, CBU | 159.80% | 1,598,000 | 2,598,000 |
| Two-stroke motorcycles | 462.38% | 4,623,800 | 5,623,800 |
| Large-engine car | 1,007.5% | 10,075,000 | 11,075,000 |
The electric motorcycle importer pays one twenty-fifth the tax of the large-car importer on the same declared value.
Which is really taxed harder?
Most people assume a car is the heavily taxed item and a motorcycle the modest one. Averaged across every line, the opposite is true:
| Cars (8703) | Motorcycles (8711) | |
|---|---|---|
| Tariff lines | 282 | 31 |
| Lowest TTI | 33.63% | 39.75% |
| Highest TTI | 1007.5% | 462.38% |
| Average TTI | 162.56% | 246.34% |
Cars reach far higher at the top — a large-engined reconditioned car at 1007.5% is the most heavily taxed line in the entire Bangladesh tariff. But the average motorcycle line is taxed 84 points harder than the average car line.
The explanation is in the shape of each distribution. Chapter 8703 contains 79 lines at 33.63% — ambulances, which drag the car average down hard. Chapter 8711 has no equivalent. Motorcycles have no humanitarian category, no commercial exemption, and no cheap band except electric.
This matters when reading any tariff summary. An average across a heading is only as meaningful as the lines inside it, and in chapter 87 those lines are not comparable goods.
The real car ladder
Strip out the ambulances and the car bands line up by supplementary duty almost perfectly:
| SD | Example | TTI |
|---|---|---|
| 0% | 87034013 microbus, new, ≤1600cc | 64.25% |
| 20% | 87031000 snow vehicles, golf cars | 96.1% |
| 45% | 87032121 reconditioned car, small engine | 135.91% |
| 100% | 87032331 reconditioned car, mid engine | 223.5% |
| 250% | 87032351 reconditioned car, larger engine | 462.38% |
| 500% | 87032411 reconditioned car, large engine | 860.5% |
Customs duty is 25% on every one of those lines. The spread from 64% to 860% is produced entirely by supplementary duty and the VAT and AT it drags behind it. Anyone quoting a vehicle from the CD column is quoting a number that explains none of the cost.
Electric is the cheapest route on both wheels and four
The tariff's clearest preference is for electric drive, and it appears in both headings:
| Code | Vehicle | CD | SD | TTI |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 87116000 | Electric motorcycle or moped | 10% | 0% | 39.75% |
| 87038012 | Electric car, value ≤ USD 25,000 | 15% | 0% | 52.0% |
| 87038022 | Electric car, CKD, USD 25,000–50,000 | 25% | 0% | 64.25% |
| 87038052 | Electric car, CKD, above USD 200,000 | 25% | 60% | 159.8% |
An electric motorcycle at 39.75% is the cheapest powered two-wheeler in the tariff — against 159.8% for an equivalent four-stroke CBU petrol machine, and 462.38% for a two-stroke. The electric car at 52% is the cheapest passenger car line outside the ambulance category.
Note how electric cars are banded by value in US dollars rather than engine capacity, which has no meaning for them. A cheap EV escapes supplementary duty entirely; an expensive one does not. The tariff has replaced one proxy for luxury with another.
The two-stroke penalty in one line
Across every capacity band in chapter 8711 the pattern repeats without exception:
| Engine | Form | SD | TTI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Four-stroke | CKD | 20% | 96.1% |
| Four-stroke | CBU | 60% | 159.8% |
| Two-stroke | CKD or CBU | 250% | 462.38% |
Look closely at the last row. For a two-stroke engine, CKD and CBU are taxed identically — 462.38% either way. Everywhere else in chapter 87 the tariff rewards local assembly; here it refuses to. Assembling a two-stroke motorcycle in Bangladesh earns no concession at all, because the policy objective is not to encourage assembly but to end the engine type.
Two-stroke engines emit far more unburnt fuel and particulates than four-stroke equivalents. A 250% supplementary duty applied regardless of assembly route is not a revenue measure. It is a phase-out written into the tariff schedule.
Practical points
- Two-stroke or four-stroke is the first question on any motorcycle shipment. Get it in writing from the supplier.
- CBU or CKD changes the line, and with it 63 percentage points. See our guide on CBU, CKD and SKD — the condition must be genuine, not a label.
- Engine capacity thresholds are hard edges: 50cc, 250cc, 500cc, 800cc. A few cc either side moves you a whole band.
- Electric is structurally favoured right now, in both CD and SD. If you are deciding what to bring in, that is the clearest signal the tariff gives.
- Never quote from customs duty alone. CD is 25% on nearly all of this. It explains none of the variation.
Browse chapter 87 for the full picture, or read reconditioned car import duty for how depreciation allowances work on used vehicles.