Every legitimate export from India — whether it's a single commercial parcel or a bulk cargo shipment — depends on a small set of documents being correct and consistent with each other: the commercial invoice, the Import Export Code (IEC), the shipping bill, and, depending on your business, GST/KYC-related paperwork.
Getting the documentation right the first time is the single biggest lever for avoiding customs delays. Most hold-ups at Indian customs or at the destination country are caused by mismatched values between the invoice and the shipping bill, a missing or invalid IEC, or incomplete KYC — not by the goods themselves.
Guides in this hub
This hub walks through the documents an exporter actually needs: how to prepare a compliant commercial invoice, what an IEC code is and how to get one from DGFT, the full checklist of export documents for a typical shipment, and the KYC requirements courier and cargo partners require before they'll book an international export.
For the customs process these documents feed into, see the Customs & Compliance hub.