What is Happening with the Custom Delays in the EU & UK?

For years we have heard about Brexit in the UK and EU, but what does this all have to do with Custom delays?

The UK has been busy with building a network of about 30 border posts to process the incoming goods. Are these ready in time? Should they not have started much earlier? More than once the UK government has been forced to delay the introduction of import checks by up to six months.

Since January 1 exports to the EU from Britain have been subject to controls.

Britain has pushed back the most important checks to January 1, 2022. This is a year later than the EU. Businesses in the UK have requested more time to adjust. Giving the businesses more time the government revised the timetable.The government hopes that this will eliminate empty shelves for some customer products.

Building Delays

In the last months there has been difficulty with many facilities needing to be built. They simply were not ready in time for the previous deadlines. This is partly due to the governments complications of funding of the new infrastructure as well as not enough space being available for a border control at some UK inland facilities.

Brokers Needed

“We’re in a situation where we have maybe millions of declarations due and we have insufficient brokers to get us out of the backlog,” a customs expert told The Loadstar.

With the building delays there is also the problem of not enough brokers to clear goods coming from the EU. Brokers clearing goods from the EU are required to have one of several certifications such as the Customs Freight Simplified Procedures (CFSP). This is not a simple task as some companies have claimed that it takes up to five months to attain the CFSP.

New VAT rules

The new VAT rules for shipments from non-EU countries applies as of July 1, 2021. What does this mean if you receive a parcel from the UK in Germany? Or  a relative sends you a package from the US to Austria or to another EU country? On July 1 the exemption of 22 euros will be abolished. This means that, as a rule, parcel consignees will have to pay import duties for all goods they order and receive in a non-EU country (e.g. China, UK, USA) in the country where the consumption of the ordered goods takes place. From this point on, all consignments from a non-EU country will have to be declared to customs meaning more time needed in the delivery of your parcel.