Gümrük Hukuku

The "tourist facilities" regime, which allows Turkish citizens living abroad, foreign retirees and dual citizens to enter Türkiye with their own vehicles, is a major convenience that opens the door to tens of thousands of vehicles each year. Yet because its rules are intricate, it is also one of the areas that generates the most administrative fines in practice: overstaying the permitted period, use of the vehicle by persons other than the right-holder, or skipping the exit f

Every year, more travellers arriving in Türkiye have their luggage flagged at the X-ray scanner and find themselves under investigation for "commercial quantities of goods" under Anti-Smuggling Law No. 5607. This guide answers questions distilled from a real case handled by our office — with all identifying details of persons, countries and locations fully anonymised — grounded in legislation and case law. Let us be clear from the outset: customs control is legitimate; the fi