You will already know that customs declarations are a necessity when conducting trade between the UK and the EU. However, you may not be aware of all of the documentation that you need to complete and checks you need to conduct when you are making a transit movement.
What is a Transit Movement?
A transit movement is when goods are moved between multiple customs territories or when goods are moved between two points of a customs territory via a separate customs territory.
Office of Transit
One common mistake that is often made with transit declarations is the section regarding the Office of Transit. It is crucial that you enter the first Transit Office that you will be passing through in the next customs territory after leaving Great Britain.
There are different codes for each Office of transit, for example -
- Calais Port Tunnel (FR620001)
- Cherbourg (FR000950)
- Dunkerque Ferry (FR590002)
- Rouen (FR003920)
Find more Office of Transit Codes.
Smart Border System
If you enter a location in France that has enforced a ‘smart border’ and you have not listed this particular Office of Transit in your declaration, you might be asked to go into the orange lanes for manual intervention. This will cause delays to your journey, further highlighting the importance of ensuring that you input the correct Office of Transit on your declaration.
Altering the Office of Transit
You may decide that you need to re-route your journey, causing the Office of Transit on your declaration to be wrong. You are able to change the Office of Transit after submitting your transit declaration if you have not yet started your transit movement. To do this you must make a new declaration. However, you may be faced with delays upon arrival at the port whilst your amendments are updated.
You can find more information regarding transit movements on the Government website.
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