Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what advice his Department is providing to importers on how to make customs declarations on goods arriving from EU member states after 29 March 2018 in the event that such declarations are required.

On 23 August, HMRC published Technical Notices on Customs, Excise and VAT procedures that would apply under no deal arrangements and the implications for businesses. HMRC has also written to 145,000 traders over the VAT threshold who currently only trade with the EU to explain the changes and to encourage them to look at the existing rest of world guidance on GOV.UK. We have also published our letter to EU only traders on GOV.UK.

We know that there would be some additional smaller businesses impacted who are not currently registered for VAT. We have engaged with trade and business representative bodies who have greater knowledge and access to these businesses. We plan to communicate through these groups, so that these smaller businesses are told about any implications. We will shortly publish a partnership pack that these representative bodies can use in their own communications.

To support the customs intermediaries sector to expand ahead of March 2019 HM Treasury and HMRC have also designed a package of measures which includes a one-off investment of £8 million to support broker training and increased automation.

HMRC’s communications plans have a phased approach and later in the year they will provide more information on what people can do should they wish to make preparations.