Two phone numbers, not one
A landline and a mobile are asked for separately. The point is reachability during the working day, since the parcel waits at a counter until the addressee comes to it and somebody has to tell them it is there.
Ghana-bound
Sending a parcel to Ghana from the United States
What a Ghanaian recipient pays is not worked out from a table before the box leaves. It is worked out at a post office counter with the box open in front of them, and the postage you chose is one of the numbers that goes into it. The revenue authority's own description of that counter, and the postal ceilings that decide what can reach it, were read on 2026-08-07.
Revenue authority, citedCeilings per productCrossing priced by a person
Assessed at the counter
The box is opened with the recipient standing there, and the duty is calculated from what the officer sees.
What happens when the box lands
The Ghana Revenue Authority publishes the procedure for goods arriving by post, and it is worth reading before you pack because it explains why the number at the end is unpredictable. Nothing is assessed from the declaration alone. Somebody opens the parcel while the recipient watches.
- A delivery note arrives with the parcel and goes to the addressee.
- Staff check that the person at the counter is the person named on it.
- Post office staff open the parcel for examination by the recipient.
- A customs officer calculates the duty payable on what is in front of them.
- Payment is made at the Ghana Post counter, which issues two receipts: one for the Ghana Post administrative charge, one for the customs duty.
Two consequences follow from step three. A vague description on the customs form buys nothing, because the officer is looking at the contents rather than the words. And a recipient who cannot get to the counter cannot delegate casually, since identity is checked against the delivery note before anything is opened.
Restricted goods add a further stop. The revenue authority notes that some items require a permit from the relevant government agency before the recipient is allowed to clear them, and that permit is obtained in Ghana by the person collecting, not in the United States by the person sending. Parcels can be handled through Accra Central, Accra North, Tema and regional post offices around the country.
Your postage is inside the sum
This is the part almost nobody expects, and it changes how a sender should choose a product. The Ghana Revenue Authority states plainly that the cost of postage is used as the freight value and a 1 percent charge is imposed, and that the value declared for protection on the item is taken into consideration when calculating the duty to be paid.
| Element | Where the figure comes from | What the sender controls |
|---|---|---|
| Goods value | Assessed from the contents at examination | What goes in the box, described accurately |
| Freight value | The postage paid, with 1 percent imposed on it | Which postal product is bought |
| Protection value | The value declared for cover on the item | Whether cover is bought and for how much |
| Ghana Post charge | An administrative charge, receipted separately | Nothing |
Follow the second row through. Paying for the express product rather than the ordinary parcel does not just cost more at this end; it enlarges the freight value the duty is computed against, so the recipient pays twice for the same decision. On a lane where a box is a gift rather than a deadline, the slower product is cheaper on both sides of the ocean.
The third row is the one that catches sellers. Declaring a high protection value feels prudent and reads to a Ghanaian customs officer as a statement about what the contents are worth. Declare what the goods are actually worth, and understand that the figure travels with the parcel into the duty calculation rather than sitting quietly on a receipt.
Three months, then it is sold
The revenue authority attaches a hard deadline to the collection process: parcels not claimed within three months are confiscated and auctioned. There is no equivalent clock on most of the destinations written up on this site, and it is the reason a shipment to Ghana needs a named person who is actually in the country.
The clock runs from arrival, not from the day the recipient hears about it. A student who travels for a term, a relative in hospital, a family member who has moved city without updating the address on the parcel: each of those is a normal life event and each of them can consume three months. Send the tracking number to the recipient the day you mail, name a second person who can collect if the first cannot, and make sure the phone number on the label reaches somebody who answers it.
The fast product takes a shorter box than the cheap one
| Product | Weight ceiling | Longest side | Length plus girth | Customs paperwork |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Priority Mail International | 66 lb | 42 in | 79 in | PS Form 2976-A inside PS Form 2976-E |
| Priority Mail Express International | 66 lb | 36 in | 79 in | PS Form 2976-B inside PS Form 2976-E |
| First-Class Package International Service | 4 lb | Small packet limits per the international manual | — | PS Form 2976 |
| First-Class Mail International | 3.5 oz letters and postcards, 15.994 oz large envelopes | Letter and flat limits | — | None, unless otherwise required |
| Airmail M-bags | 66 lb | One direct sack to one addressee | — | PS Form 2976 |
| “Global Express Guaranteed” | Listed as not available to Ghana | — | — | — |
Two rows deserve a second look. The express product stops at 36 inches on the longest side where the ordinary parcel allows 42, which inverts the usual relationship between price and capacity. A 40-inch box has exactly one postal route to Ghana and it is the slower one. The 79-inch length-and-girth figure is tight as well, so on this lane a parcel is far more likely to be refused for shape than for weight.
The M-bag row is open, and that is a real saving on printed matter. A church shipping hymnals, a school sending textbooks or a family sending a run of study guides to one address can use the direct sack rather than paying parcel weight per carton. The fastest postal product is not merely suspended here, as it is to a good many destinations. It is listed as not available to Ghana at all, so there is no date on which it comes back.
Ghana sits in price group 9 for both parcel products, 5 for the lightweight package product and 7 for letters and sacks, so the range is priced off three different tables rather than one. Starting prices across the international products are on our guide to what each one carries, and they are the operator's figures rather than ours.
Valuables are refused in one line and admitted in the next
The listing prohibits “Currency: banknotes, treasury notes, currency notes, coins, and other valuable articles” and then, a section later, restricts rather than bans the things most people mean by valuables: manufactured and unmanufactured platinum, gold and silver, precious stones, and jewelry may only be sent in insured Priority Mail International parcels.
The two entries are not in conflict once you read them as answering different questions. Money itself does not go. Metal and stones do go, and they go by exactly one route. A gold chain in a padded envelope on the lightweight package product is not a thriftier version of the same shipment; it is a shipment Ghana does not accept, and the product it has to travel on is one that caps at 42 inches and 66 lb.
Kenya, the other African destination written up here, settles the same question the other way and prohibits gold, silver, precious stones and jewelry outright. Two lanes on the same continent, opposite instructions, and no single procedure that satisfies both.
Four ways to reach one recipient
Ghana asks for more contact detail on the label than any other listing transcribed on this site. For Registered Mail, the lightweight package product, Priority Mail International and Priority Mail Express International alike, the sender is to display the addressee's landline and mobile telephone numbers, and digital address and email address, where those exist, on the address label or the customs form.
A digital address
The listing asks for the addressee's digital address, a field that appears on no other country listing transcribed on this site. Ask the recipient for theirs rather than guessing at it, and copy it onto the label exactly as they give it to you.
An email address
Also requested on the label or the form. Given the three-month collection clock, an email that reaches the recipient is worth more on this lane than it is on most.
Fill in every field the recipient can supply. The request is phrased as conditional, which invites a sender to skip it, but each missing field is one fewer way for the post office to tell somebody that a box is sitting in Accra with a clock running on it.
Prohibitions with a condition attached
Most prohibition lists are absolute. Two entries on Ghana's are written conditionally, which means the item is admissible if it is prepared properly and refused if it is not, and the judgement is made at the border rather than by you.
Fish and meat products that are not properly processed
Processed is doing the work in that sentence. Shelf-stable, sealed and commercially packed reads differently from home-smoked fish in a bag, and the box is being opened at the counter.
Liquids that are not properly packaged
Not a ban on liquids, a ban on badly contained ones. Double-bag, tape the cap, and pack so that a leak stays inside the inner container rather than reaching the other contents.
The absolute entries
Arms and ammunition, offensive weapons, live animals, narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances as defined by the International Narcotics Control Board, pornographic materials, radioactive materials, and perishable biological substances of both the infectious and noninfectious kind.
Nothing softens a conditional entry into a safe bet. If food is the point of the parcel, send it commercially sealed with the labeling intact and the description on the form matching what is printed on the packet, because the officer reading the form will shortly be looking at the packet.
The one figure here that is ours to give
Everything quoted above belongs to somebody else. The levies are the revenue authority’s, the ceilings are the Postal Service’s, and neither becomes ours by being reprinted here. What SMKlog does quote is the American leg: two ZIP codes, and a box is priced for the run to a consolidator, a barrel service or a relative who is flying to Accra. That tool stops at the customs frontier and does not pretend otherwise.
For the crossing, send the weight, the dimensions, the contents and the Ghanaian address through freight review. A person comes back with what the movement costs and which products the ceilings above still permit for that box, which on this lane is a shorter list than most senders assume. Worth remembering while you wait for that answer: whatever the crossing costs is a number the counter in Accra will fold into the duty it assesses.
Where these rules come from
- United States Postal Service, Individual Country Listing — Ghana — prohibitions, the restriction on precious metals and jewelry, the contact-detail observation, customs forms and every service ceiling above. Read 2026-08-07.
- Ghana Revenue Authority, Importing Through the Post Office — the counter procedure, the delivery note, postage as freight value with 1 percent imposed, the protection value, the two receipts, the permit requirement and the three-month auction rule. Read 2026-08-07.
- United States Postal Service, Individual Country Listing — Kenya — the single point of comparison drawn above, that Kenya lists gold, silver, platinum, precious stones and jewelry under prohibitions rather than restrictions. Read 2026-08-07.
- United States Postal Service, Country Price Groups and Weight Limits — the price group and weight cross-check for Ghana. Read 2026-08-07.
- United States Postal Service, international service alerts — checked for Ghana on 2026-08-07; the destination does not appear on the suspension list, last updated that day.
Ghanaian tariff treatment changes with the national budget and the country listing is revised without notice. Everything above is what those pages carried on the date shown, and the duty a particular parcel attracts is settled by the officer who opens it.
Common questions
Is a parcel to Ghana opened at the post office?
Yes. The revenue authority describes the recipient bringing a delivery note, proving who they are, and the parcel then being opened by post office staff for examination in front of them. A customs officer works out the duty from what is in the box, and it is settled at the Ghana Post counter.
Does the postage paid change the duty in Ghana?
Yes. The revenue authority states that the cost of postage is used as the freight value with a 1 percent charge imposed, and that the value declared for protection is taken into account as well. Choosing the faster product raises the figure the recipient is assessed on.
How long can a parcel sit uncollected in Ghana?
Three months. The revenue authority states that parcels not claimed within three months are confiscated and auctioned. A recipient who travels needs somebody else briefed to collect, because the deadline runs whether or not they know the box arrived.
What is the longest box Ghana will take?
42 inches on the longest side and 79 inches for length plus girth on Priority Mail International, at 66 lb. The express product is tighter, capped at 36 inches on the longest side, so a long box has to travel on the slower service or not at all.
Can jewelry be mailed to Ghana?
Only inside an insured Priority Mail International parcel. The country listing names that as the single admissible route for manufactured and unmanufactured platinum, gold and silver, precious stones and jewelry, while currency and other valuable articles are prohibited outright.