Brexit

As news becomes available on the UK's trading position with the European Union after the UK leaves the EU, we will post details and links here.

1) Withdrawal Agreement: The UK and the EU negotiators have jointly published an agreed Withdrawal Agreement, an outline of the political declaration and an accompanying joint statement. These slides explain the Withdrawal Agreement, the outline political declaration and the accompanying joint statement. Click here to view or download

2) Advice to Businesses exporting to the EU in a 29 March 2019 ‘no deal’ scenario
The Government has issued a step by step guide of steps to be taken in the event of a no deal. This is a clear document to help with your contingency planning - click here to view

Additional useful summaries can be found in the Government's Partnership Pack - click here to view

3) Government Technical Notices in Event of a No Deal Scenario

The Government has issued a series of technical notices setting out information to allow businesses to understand what they would need to do in a ‘no deal’ scenario, so they can make informed plans and preparations. All of these can be viewed at www.gov.uk. We have listed below those which we see as most relevant to exporting businesses:

4) FSA documents published on 15 October that relate to: Health and Identification marking; Importing high risk foods and animal feed; Exporting GM food and animal feed. All documents describe the situation in relation to a no Brexit deal

Advice to Businesses exporting to the EU in a 29 March 2019 ‘no deal’ scenario
After the UK leaves the EU, in the event of a ‘no deal’ scenario, businesses exporting goods to the EU will be required to follow customs procedures in the same way that they currently do when exporting goods to a non-EU country.

Before exporting goods to the EU, a business will need to:

register for an UK EORI number. You do not need to take action now but you will want to familiarise yourself with this process
ensure their contracts and International Terms and Conditions of Service (INCOTERMS) reflect that they are now an exporter
consider how they will submit export declarations, including whether to engage a customs broker, freight forwarder or logistics provider (businesses that want to do this themselves will need to acquire the appropriate software and secure the necessary authorisations from HMRC). Engaging a customs broker or acquiring the appropriate software and authorisations from HMRC will come at a cost.

When exporting goods to the EU, a business will need to:

have a valid EORI number
submit an export declaration to HMRC using their software or on-line, or get their customs broker, freight forwarder, or logistics provider to do this for them. The export declaration may need to be lodged in advance so that permission to export is granted before the goods leave the UK (the export declaration also counts as an Exit Summary Declaration )
businesses may also need to apply for an export licence or provide supporting documentation to export specific types of goods from the UK, or to meet the conditions of the relevant customs export procedure.

When exporting duty suspended excise goods to the EU, a business will need to continue to use EMCS to record the duty suspended movement from a UK warehouse or premises to the port of export. Find out more about how to move, store and trade duty-suspended and duty-paid excise goods.

For information on the VAT process for UK businesses exporting goods to the EU please consult the ‘VAT for businesses if there’s no Brexit deal’ technical notice.