Importing and Exporting in 2023 – Top Tips
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Top tips for importing and exporting goods | ChamberCustoms expert advice
What are the essential things to remember when you are importing goods?
1. Be Accurate. Keep Proof.
When you’re declaring goods, you are making a legal declaration. Therefore, you must provide accurate information. Our top tip is to ensure that the figures you’re quoting on your customs declaration, or the numbers and details you’re instructing your agent to declare, are consistent in all of your documentation.
Why? Because HMRC will require paperwork to support what you’re declaring. For example, your goods may attract a documentary check: if you’ve declared that your goods weigh 200 kilos, HMRC will expect to see paperwork that confirms that the weight of the goods is 200 kilos.
And if you’ve done some strange calculations, arbitrarily apportioned weights and values, you may struggle to explain it or even remember what you did.
2. Don’t Export Using Incoterms® Ex-Works
When you’re declaring goods, you are making a legal declaration. Therefore, you must provide accurate information. Our top tip is to ensure that the figures you’re quoting on your customs declaration, or the numbers and details you’re instructing your agent to declare, are consistent in all of your documentation.
Why? Because HMRC will require paperwork to support what you’re declaring. For example, your goods may attract a documentary check: if you’ve declared that your goods weigh 200 kilos, HMRC will expect to see paperwork that confirms that the weight of the goods is 200 kilos.
And if you’ve done some strange calculations, arbitrarily apportioned weights and values, you may struggle to explain it or even remember what you did.
What are Incoterms®?
Incoterms stands for International Commercial Terms.
Incoterms® is an international convention that establishes the responsibility of the buyer and the seller when entering into a purchase/sale contract.
Example 1:
At one end of the scale, we have Ex Works. Here, the exporter (seller) is responsible for almost nothing- they are just responsible for delivering a box outside their factory door.
On the other hand, the importer is responsible for everything, picking up the goods, exporting, transporting, importing and delivering. However appealing as this may seem, the flip side of the coin is that the exporter has no control over how the goods will be exported.
Example 2:
On the other side of the scale, we have DDP (Delivered Duty Paid), where the seller takes all the responsibilities on board to pack, export, transport, import in the foreign country and deliver. In this case, the seller needs to carefully consider how they can lawfully import their goods into a foreign country where they may not be an established business.
There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. ChamberCustoms can train you and your team to understand what Incoterms® you should be using when trading internationally.
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