GVMS - Effective 1 December declarants will be required to monitor the arrival of goods

As a result of The Customs (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2023, with effect from 1 December, declarants will be required to ensure that the GVMS declarations that they create are “arrived” following the importation of the goods.

This requirement clearly reflects the difficulty that Border Force and HM Revenue & Customs experience at the roll-on roll-off ports, whereby hauliers are failing to record import declarations within the GVMS system and so automatically allow for the clearance of goods.

There are many reasons for this, e.g. the haulier quotes the MRN for a T1 and not the associated import, only one declaration needs to be recorded against the vehicle and others are omitted, the haulier can use the loophole of registering an import by oral declaration or the haulier can register an EORI of a declarant that is known to hold a CFSP EIDR approval.

Rather than adequately police incoming vehicles to ensure that hauliers are fulfilling their role under GVMS and penalising those that are effectively complicit in smuggling, the burden has been passed to the declarant even though they have no control over the entry of the goods to the UK.

As this role is specifically laid to the declarant, they will be liable to a penalty of £2,500 for any declaration that is not cleared.