Customs

Customs administration of exports

If goods are transported from the area of the European Union to countries outside of the EU, the application of some kind of customs procedure is a mandatory requirement. Transport may be final (e.g. export) or of temporary nature (e.g. rental of equipment, or transport of goods and installations to an exposition) as well.

Customs administration of imports

If goods are imported into the area of the European Union from any country outside of the EU they must be subjected to some kind of customs procedure. Exactly which customs procedure should be applied depends, among other things, the type of the import. Goods may be entering for final purposes (e.g. import) or on a temporary basis (leasing or rental of equipment, objects transported for exposition or fair, etc.), or even for further processing.

The selection of the appropriate customs procedure is an obligation stipulated by legislation..

Forwarding of goods, guarantee for forwarding of goods

If the customs affairs the goods are not sought to be administered within the area of the customs authority where the goods are currently located, the goods subject to customs are dispatched to the area of competence of the respective customs authority under a so-called customs forwarding procedure. Given that public debts must either be paid or a guarantee must be provided for their payment, the forwarding of such goods is also subject to the provision of a customs guarantee.

The goods forwarding procedure is typically applied for transports between the border of entry and the domestic place of destination. Equally, such procedure is used for transport from a customs warehouse to the border of exit also.

Simplified customs procedures

Simplified customs procedures essentially consist in the license holder (e.g. SPW Ltd.) being allowed to administer a large part of the customs procedures at its own sites without the involvement of the customs authority.

As a result, the time requirement of the procedures is not influenced by the current “throughput capacity” of the customs authority or its office hours. Therefore, customs procedures can be done even between during two bank holidays during the nighttime, if required for production reasons for example.

Economic customs procedures

This includes for example the processing of raw materials in third (non-EU) countries exported under a toll manufacturing agreement or, conversely, when goods imported from third countries are processed in the EU area and the finished goods are transported back.

This might also occur when products are manufactured for export from imported raw materials (import = import from third countries, export = export to third countries).

Customs warehousing

Customs warehousing also qualifies as an economic customs procedure. This should be used for example when some or all of the goods procured through imports is to be sold or processed at a date later than the date of arrival. Since the customs duties and the relevant public debts (e.g. VAT) do not have to be settled during the period of customs warehousing, the importer’s money is not “tied up” in public debts. Equally, goods for it is unknown at the date of arrival if they will be sold within or outside of the EU should also be stored in a customs warehouse. Given that the duties payable on imported goods cannot in such cases be reclaimed, they should not be paid in the first place.