I’ve got a trip to Spain pencilled in next month and as we aren’t doing much there these days I’m planning to buy as many ■■■■ as possible but I have heard that in France, the Douanes have got stroppy with drivers who have Spanish cigarettes in far smaller numbers than those tolerated by Customs and Excise at Dover.
Is this true, and if so what amount will they tolerate?
acording to the Spanish Duanes at Irun, the French only allow 800 cigs or 2kg of Baccy, I have heard the same from other drivers.
jimti:
acording to the Spanish Duanes at Irun, the French only allow 800 cigs or 2kg of Baccy, I have heard the same from other drivers.
I had 2,000 under me bunk when that woman Douanne in Dieppe was avin a butchers around me cab, she made it very clear that they ‘took a dim view of it’ but would let it go “this once”, she also made it clear that had her colleague (the 5’ 1" black guy with a really bad attitude) found them I would have lost them ALL!!
Ross.
PS, this was in 2008.
i was doing portugal and spain regular 2 years ago, mainly coming back through irun, i’d say 8 out of 10 times, the french would stop me, they were very keen then on the ciggies mate. they seemed to think 400-600 was ok, over that, they said i’d have a prob, so much for a united europe then 
Totally illegal of course, but when has that ever bothered the french. Make sure you get a receipt for them and tell him you want to take his photograph as evidence when you make a claim. That gets them really wound up.
hi,i got my cigs and baccy at irun…5 thousand cigs and 3 cases whiskey and 3 cases vodka…the guy that run the shop used to give me a receipt with the spanish tax included…if i got pulled by the french customs i just flashed the receipt and got waved through…that was about 7 years ago…ive heard they are clamping down abit now…i got that amout every trip lol…u have to speculate to acumalate…i made a fortune 
…theted…