octroi

Meanings

1. 1noununcountabletechnicalfinance

   A tax charged by a town or district on goods brought in from outside, usually collected at the entrance.

   Grammar: Used as a mass noun: you pay octroi, not 'an octroi', when talking about the tax itself.

   Patterns

   • pay octroi on something
   • levy octroi
   • collect octroi at the gate

   Traders bringing cloth into the old city had to pay octroi at the northern gate.

   The council raised money through octroi on grain and salt.

   Records show that octroi was collected here for more than two centuries.

2. 2nouncountabletechnicalold-fashioned

   The office or gate where this local tax is collected.

   Grammar: Countable here, so you can say 'an octroi' or 'the octrois' when referring to the places.

   Patterns

   • at the octroi
   • pass through the octroi

   Carts lined up at the octroi before dawn.

   The old octroi still stands beside the road into town.

Word forms

Common combinations

pay octroi

Merchants had to pay octroi before entering the market.

octroi duty

Octroi duty made imported goods noticeably more expensive.

octroi post

A guard was stationed at each octroi post.

abolish octroi

The city decided to abolish octroi and rely on property taxes.

octroi collection

Octroi collection was farmed out to private agents.

Synonyms and how they differ

toll

A toll is a charge for using a road, bridge or ferry, while octroi is a tax on goods entering a town or district.

duty

Duty is the general word for a tax on goods; octroi is the narrow, historical local kind.

levy

A levy is any imposed charge or fee, not specifically one collected at a town gate.

Word family

octroi noun

The tax itself, or the place where it is collected.

Commonly confused: octroi or octal?

Practice

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “octroi”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.

Explore more words