Sourcing lighters from China

0% duty

Read from the UK Trade Tariff on 26 September 2026, lighters of heading 9613 carried 0% duty on goods from China, with no anti-dumping measure. Butane refill cans are classified separately in heading 3606, also at 0%, so confirm the commodity code for each item on the order.

Child resistance and the novelty ban

Commission Decision 2006/502/EC requires lighters to be child-resistant, meaning they cannot be operated by children under 51 months in normal or foreseeable use, and bans novelty lighters: lighters shaped like toys, food, animals, cartoon characters or other objects that appeal to children, or with music, flashing lights or moving parts. Trading Standards enforce these rules under the General Product Safety Regulations 2005. Lighters meeting EN 13869 are presumed child-resistant, and EN 13869 in turn requires the lighter to meet the safety specification EN ISO 9994, which covers flame height, burning behaviour, drop and temperature tests and resistance to leaking.

Every model needs a child-resistance test report from a laboratory accredited to ISO/IEC 17025, describing the lighter, its dimensions and operating forces, and the importer should hold it before the goods land. Expensive refillable lighters can be exempt from the child-resistance test only with a written guarantee of at least two years, a design repairable over at least five years and a service network, so cheap refillables need testing like disposables.

Shipping and electric lighters

Gas lighters are dangerous goods, UN 1057 in class 2.1, so they ship by sea with a dangerous goods declaration, suitable packaging and a carrier that accepts them, and they are generally not accepted as ordinary air cargo. Plan for the extra freight, the smaller pool of carriers and the storage rules for flammable gases at your warehouse.

Rechargeable arc and plasma lighters use no fuel, but they contain lithium batteries, which need UN 38.3 test summaries for transport and bring waste electrical equipment and battery producer duties in the UK; see the batteries guide and the promotional merchandise guide for printed lighters.

Worked duty example

Take a hypothetical order of 500,000 disposable gas lighters, entered under 9613 10 00 00: £40,000 free on board plus £4,000 of freight and insurance gives a customs value of £44,000. Disposable lighters carry no duty, so import VAT of 20% on £44,000, £8,800, is the only tax. A VAT-registered importer normally reclaims it, so the border adds no lasting cost. Freight is higher than for ordinary goods of this size because lighters ship as dangerous goods. Step by step: UK import duty and VAT.

What goes wrong

Lighters fail on child resistance, flame and leaks. A factory submits a tested sample and then ships a cheaper mechanism that children can operate, flames flare far above the set height or cannot be adjusted down, valves leak gas in warm containers, and bodies crack when dropped. Printed or shaped designs cross into the novelty ban, and cartons arrive without dangerous goods markings, so the carrier rejects them.

Match every production batch to the tested model, including the child-resistant mechanism and its operating force, measure flame height and run drop and warm-storage leak checks on samples from the line, review all artwork against the novelty ban before printing, and check dangerous goods marks, labels and declarations before the container is booked.

Cambridge China Bridge sources disposable, refillable and electric lighters, with EN 13869 and EN ISO 9994 test reports checked against the model you are buying. See how we source lighters.