They shop heavily for diamond rings, iPads, the latest Nokia mobile phone models, Chanel perfume and Meiji baby formula from Japan and look no different from other mainlanders. But they're on a mainland customs blacklist, with officers automatically alerted when they cross the border to Shenzhen.
More than 1,000 professional smugglers have been seized by Shenzhen and Zhuhai customs in a massive month-long crackdown on the smuggling of tax-free electronic and luxury products from Hong Kong and Macau to the mainland.
The criminals, known as ant smuggling gangs because of their resemblance to a column of ants moving back and forth, have seen their business increase now that inflation on the mainland is running at a two-year high.
Steep duties of up to 50 per cent announced by the General Administration of Customs on merchandise worth more than 5,000 yuan (HK$5,830) brought into the mainland are another reason.
The ant smuggling gangs, which split goods into smaller lots that are then carried into the mainland by individuals in order to evade taxes of 20 per cent or more, have become so popular that Shenzhen customs officers seized 142 mobile phones from nursemaids of cross-border students in 14 cases before the crackdown began last month.
It was not only the nursemaids, a Shenzhen customs spokesman told the South China Morning Post. 'Ant smuggling gangs also hire disabled or elderly people, pregnant women and youngsters to ship goods, making it difficult for customs to detect smugglers,' he said.