Shipping your belongings to Australia
The B534 form, cleaning and packing for biosecurity inspection, and labelling your boxes when you ship household goods to Australia.
In short
If you send household goods by sea or air, they arrive separately from you. Biosecurity officers check them before you can collect them, so how you clean and pack matters.
What to do
Skip this if you are only bringing suitcases. If you are shipping, prepare your goods and paperwork before they leave.
What you need to know
- Fill in the Unaccompanied Personal Effects Statement (form B534) and lodge it with your packing list and bill of lading or air waybill. There are penalties for false information, and not declaring risk items can lead to prosecution
- Clean anything that may carry soil, insects or plant material: shoes and boots (take the laces out), garden furniture and tools, bicycles, sports and camping gear, barbecues. Empty and clean vacuum cleaner bags, and vacuum rugs and mats
- Pack risk items, including footwear, together and apart from everything else
- Number your boxes and list what is in each and what it is made of, for example 'wooden chair' or 'cane basket'. Note which boxes hold declared items
- Wooden items may need treatment, such as fumigation, before they are released
A recent arrival's tip: shipping can be delayed at each stage, so plan to live simply for your first weeks, and compare quotes and what each shipping company includes. Biosecurity points are from the Department of Agriculture.
Preparing your personal effects for shipment (Department of Agriculture) ↗Unaccompanied Personal Effects Statement, B534 (Australian Border Force, PDF) ↗Moving to Australia with household goods (Department of Agriculture) ↗