Simplified process for Internal Market Movements Webinar

[Note: The information contained herein is accurate at the date of this event, however please refer to the written guidance on the Northern Ireland Customs & Trade Academy (NICTA) website for the most up to date guidance.]

Good afternoon and welcome to this webinar from the Trader Support Service or TSS.

In this webinar, we’ll be discussing the simplified processes for Internal Market Movements, what this means for users now and over the next six months, outline the time ahead for getting ready It’s the next step in the process, of us providing more information so that you can be fully prepared for the new Windsor Framework arrangements by 31st of March 2025. On the Northern Ireland Customs and Trade Academy website, which is often shortened to NICTA, there are also further educational resource available, such as previous webinar recordings and bulletins. We’ll load this webinar recording to NICTA shortly after and encourage you to visit NICTA if you’ve not already done so. On the next slide, you will see today’s agenda in detail.

We’ll begin by introducing you to the simplified processes and delve into these processes and eligibility, as well as goods categorisation. Next, we’ll look at the IMMI data guide.

Following this, we’ll discuss the Trader Goods Profile and then we’ll look at the trader journeys available.

And finally, before wrapping up, we’ll also answer some of the questions you provided on registering and submitted in the live chat. If you’re new to TSS or wish to find out more about it, you can scan the QR code which is on screen at the moment. The QR code will also be displayed at the end of the webinar, or you can use the links that we provide later on or simply Google Trader Support Service. I’m going to introduce you to the speakers of today’s webinar. It is my delight to welcome today’s speakers; Shanker Singham, Mark Brown and Vicky Goddard.

Shanker Singham is the TSS customs and trade policy lead. Shanker is one of the world’s leading trade lawyers. A recognised author, advisor to governments and companies as well as an academic fellow of the Institute of Economic Affairs. Mark represents HMRC’s NI Customs Policy team. Mark has 15 years’ experience in Whitehall and Brussels and his team are responsible for policy aspects of the Windsor Framework. Vicky is a key stakeholder for the TSS and our Partnerships Director. Vicky is also an accredited Customs and Trade specialist with more than 20 years of experience and specialises in customs compliance. A very good welcome to all. Thank you for joining us. However, before we hear from them further, I’m going to introduce the first of our three polls. The 1st is: Are you planning on using the simplified processes for your GB – NI goods movements? and while that runs, I’m going to run through some quick housekeeping notes for myself. Firstly, feel free to go to the webinar dashboard to put in any questions you may have. We have a Q & A section at the end where we’ll address many of your questions as possible and we’ll prioritise questions that are as relevant to the wider audience. So we won’t be going to any company or sector specific queries as such, if you’re TSS registered and have specific questions we ask you contact the TSS contact Centre or raise a case with your query by the TSS portal.

And finally, if you’re not already registered with TSS, we encourage you to sign up for this free service so we can support you if you have any specific questions. Most of you have already voted I’m just going to let the poll run for another couple of seconds. Thank you to everyone who has, and then I’m going to share the results with you.

So exactly 50% say you are planning on using the simplified processes for your GB and NI goods movements. 44% say they’re not sure or haven’t decided, 2% say no and 4% say they continue as is.

To my panellists, do we have any comments on that poll result? Is that about what we expected?

Yes. So that is interesting.

I mean it is good that we see 50% saying yes, you intend to do it.

and if you add that to the “not sure”, “haven’t decided” and we hope that this webinar obviously helps you to decide, that’s the bulk of the people who have responded so I think, hopefully we’ll be able to knock that 44% down a little bit as a result of the webinar and enable people to make their decisions. That’s quite a good, interesting result, I think.

Thank you, Shanker. I’m just going to quickly hide the poll. It is over to you Shanker, for the first section of today’s webinar. Great, thanks very much. So the first section is going to be an introduction to the simplified processes. We’re going to talk about processes and eligibility and then about how to categorise your goods, which is an essential part of being eligible to use the processes. Can we go to the next slide, please.

The first prerequisite for using the simplified processes is the UKIMS, the UK Internal Market Scheme. We’ve talked to you about the UK Internal Market Scheme in the past.

We have a webinar specifically on UKIMS which we encourage you to review because UKIMS is the prerequisite for using these processes. If you’re not UKIMS authorised, then you will see all the crosses on this slide, you will not be able to benefit from any of the Windsor Framework simplified processes. If you are UKIMS authorised, you benefit from all of them. Just to go through them, the access to the simplified processes, the reduced data set that we will be discussing with you about the Internal Market Movement Information, you will have access to a Trader Goods Profile that makes it easier for you to submit that Internal Market Movement information or IMMI, you will be eligible for what’s called UKIMS EIDR, that’s Entry into Declarant’s Records, that is not something that TSS users need to worry about, they don’t need to worry about that because that it is an HMRC simplification that you get outside of the TSS, TSS already has Entry into Declarants’ records for Traders.

There is increased access to “not at risk” declarations and you need to bear in mind that UKIMS is a prerequisite for making a “not at risk” declaration. You need to know that your goods are the “particular goods” themselves are moving entirely within the internal market of the UK.

So’ it’s a two-step process that you have to think about. You also get access to the UK tariff rate quotas, so if you are moving things from Rest of World into Northern Ireland, there is a UK tariff rate quota and there’s an EU tariff rate quota.

You have access to the UK tariff rate quota if you are a UKIMS authorised person. You can also declare certain Agri-foods using NIRMS as standard goods. So you can use NIRMS separately, it’s a separate scheme, but if you are both UKIMS using the simplified processes and are also on NIRMS you can declare those Agri-foods as standard goods as opposed to controlled goods, which is an advantage. We will go over that in due course, can we go to the next slide, please.

So, eligibility to access simplified processes for Internal Market Movements.

I mentioned previously that you have to be UKIMS authorised. In addition, the following conditions also have to be met. So the goods themselves must be “not at risk” of entering the EU i.e., you’ve got to be very confident these goods are moving entirely within the internal market. They must be in free circulation. If they are subject to customs processes like warehousing or other customs facilitations that would not apply here. They must be moving in direct transport from GB to Northern Ireland, and just a side note on that, that includes the transit journey from GB to Northern Ireland via Ireland, and they must be standard goods or Category 2 goods. I’m going to talk to you in a second about what are standard goods, what are Category 2 goods and what are Category 1 goods. Category 1 goods are the goods that cannot benefit from simplified processes.

Goods that are moved from GB to Northern Ireland, which can’t be declared not at risk will be automatically moving at risk and the applicable EU duty rate subject to waivers or reliefs will apply.

So that is goods, for example, subject to commercial processing where the additional requirements are not met, and I refer you to the UKIMS webinar and the detailed information we provided you with on those, goods to which trade remedies are applied, so this could be, anti-dumping duties, countervailing duties, safeguard measures. They would not be able to move “not at risk”, goods which are subject to customs special procedures. That also includes things like return goods relief, temporary admission, and onward supply relief, so those would have to move “at risk”. If you do have a movement that is “at risk” and you can subsequently show the goods have stayed in Northern Ireland or have been consumed in Northern Ireland, you can reclaim the duty that has been paid through the duty reimbursement scheme, which is an HMRC process. Again, we referred to a lot of that in the previous UKIMS webinar.

If we go to the next slide, please.

So what are these facilitations that ease the process of moving goods from GB to Northern Ireland? Well, the principle one is the simplified data set, which is the Internal Market Movement Information and we are going to talk to you in this presentation about exactly what you need to provide. The Trader Goods Profile, traders that are UKIMS registered and moving under the simplified processes will have a Trader Goods Profile which will support the completion and auto-population of some data on the IMMI. So, the TGP, Trader Goods Profile is intended to make your life easier in terms of submitting that IMMI Information.

And then just for completeness, we are including something on UKIMS EIDR that I mentioned before.

If you are a TSS trader, you do not need to worry about this, but there is an additional thing for traders who want to use entry into declarants’ records if they are UKIMS authorised, and they want to use their own facilitation there and not do it through the TSS.

But again, if you’re a TSS user, you don’t need to worry about this. If you go to the next slide, please. So, how does goods categorisation work with the simplified processes, and we are conscious this is somewhat new to you, so we are going to take you through that fairly slowly.

Traders that are using the simplified processes, the first thing you need to do is categorise your goods and determine whether they are in fact eligible to move under simplified processes.

This is a process that has been agreed between the UK and the EU, and it depends on the specific composition and origin of the goods. Goods can be categorised basically into three categories; Category 1, Category 2 and Standard. Only Category 1 goods are not eligible for the simplified processes. Category 2 and Standard goods are eligible for the simplified processes.

The category of your goods informs how you can complete your Internal Market Movement Information, or IMMI. So, how do you categorise? Can we go to the next slide.

The red box there is Category 1 because those are the ones that can’t move under simplified processes, so they’re excluded, so that’s the first check you would do, are my goods excluded?

And they would be excluded if they’re subject to bans or prohibitions, so these are things like firearms and so forth. Trade defence measures, I mentioned trade remedies, those sorts of things, safeguards, anti-dumping, countervailing duties. If you’re claiming the Union tariff rate quota, if the importer is claiming the European Union tariff rate quota, European Union quotas other than tariff rate quotas, those goods would not benefit from the simplified processes.

And finally, we’ve referred to Article 215 of the Treaty for the Functioning of the European Union, the TFEU that is basically things like economic sanctions, some diplomatic sanctions, that kind of area so as long as goods are not falling into that area, then they will be able to move either as Category 2 or Standard. Having eliminated Category 1, hopefully, because goods are not in Category 1, then we have to ask whether they’re category 2 or Standard. Category 2 are permitted to move under UKIMS, but they need an 8-digit commodity code, and we’ll talk to you a little bit later about how the TGP helps you with that and how other tools help you with that. But Category 2 essentially includes those excise products and goods subject to special health licensing or environmental controls. And for excise products, we’ve had a few questions on this, the EMCS system still applies, so you still have to follow those processes for excise goods. Note that the list of Category 2 goods is different from the control goods list under SCDP, the Simplified Customs Declaration Process and you will need for certain goods additional procedure codes. So you’ve got 2 procedure codes for excise goods. Excise goods not subject to documentary controls will move with the additional procedure code 1EN the Category 2 excise goods subject to documentary controls licenses those sorts of things will move as 1EL and Category 2 non-excise goods that are subject to documentary controls, licenses will move under 1LG.

Your goods may be Category 2 goods, if they’re not Category 2 and they are not Category 1, they may be standard and are permitted to move also under UKIMS and under the simplified processes, they will move with a six-digit commodity code. And standard goods must have no import controls, not excise, not subject to special health licensing, environmental controls and they move under an additional procedure code, which is 1SG which indicates standard goods. Can we go to the next slide, please.

We’ve done a little bit of an example here about how you do and how you work with categorisation, and we’ve used an example of umbrellas moving from GB to Northern Ireland. So, the first thing is you classify the goods, so you know the commodity code, and in this particular case, we’ve got country-of-origin as China. Do the goods meet any of the Category 1 requirements? Is the first question. In this case, they don’t have sanctions or restrictions, so they’re exempt from Category 1. And the next question is do the goods meet any of the Category 2 requirements? And you can see there that they don’t require any special controls or licenses, so they are exempt from Category 2. They do meet the conditions to be categorised as standard goods and they’re therefore eligible for the simplified process moving with the six-digit commodity code, which is 660191 and that populates the Internal Market Movement Information.

And you would use the additional procedure code 1SG for that particular example.

If we move to the next slide please.

So let’s look at a different example, which is a Category 2 example. And this is roasted coffee beans coming from Colombia, from GB to Northern Ireland. The commodity code you classify first you’ve got the commodity code there, you look at the particular goods and you determine are they are Category 1, in this case the goods don’t have any sanctions or restrictions, so they’re not Category 1. Do they meet any of the Category 2 requirements? The goods here are subject to controls, organic controls and veterinary controls. You require a CHED-P with these goods. So they are categorised as Category 2. They’re eligible for the simplified processes, but that you need to use an 8-digit commodity code 09012100 in this case to populate the Internal Market Movement Information and you use the additional procedure code 1LG for this particular type of goods. Then go to the next slide please.

So, what we’re going to do here is just look at the impact of categorisation of a particular type of goods like the ones we just talked about the coffee beans from Colombia, If you’re also additionally using the NIRMS scheme, that’s the Northern Ireland Retail Movement Scheme if you recall, that is a DEFRA scheme. They are separate schemes, but you might be moving the goods under the Northern Ireland Retail Movement Scheme as well as seeking to use simplified processes. We’re giving you this information because we’re going to show you an additional simplification that comes from using both of these together.

You may be able to declare these goods as standard goods using the Internal Market Movement Information with a six-digit commodity code, provided first of all the same checks as before. Do they meet any of the Category 1 requirements? No, they do not have any sanctions or restrictions. Do they meet any of the Category 2 requirements? They do, so therefore they’re eligible for simplified processes. But let’s say these goods are also moving under NIRMS. That move is supported by a General Certificate as opposed to an Export Health Certificate, (EHC). They’re supported by a packing list. They can be treated for customs purposes as standard goods and this provides an added benefit for you if you’re using both NIRMS and UKIMS authorisations. So. the NIRMS trader can use the first 6-digits of the commodity code, to populate the Internal Market Movement Information and the additional procedure code 1SG.

That’s the standard goods additional procedure code. So if we go to the next slide, please.

So what support is going to be available for you? We’re conscious that this is a new thing for you. So the TSS will certainly provide support to complete your IMMI by providing information about your goods category and the additional procedure code that you will need.

We will also provide an interactive process via the TSS portal which uses the Northern Ireland Online Trade Tariff Tool that will confirm your goods categorisation when you’re entering this information into the Trader Goods Profile or directly into Internal Market Movement Information in the TSS, and issue resolution on the new processes if anything new comes up.

You know the TSS is available for you in the usual way. There is other support. We mentioned the Northern Ireland Online Tariff Tool that can also be used to help identify which categories apply to goods.

There is HMRC support via e-mail and helpline. You’ve got NICTA, and you’ve also got the content of all the webinars to help you. We have, certainly a lot of help available to get you through this process. And if we go to the next slide, yes, I’m handing back over now.

Thanks, Shanker, that was very useful. I’m just going to return to ask you the next in our series of polls. So next one to know, can you readily classify and categorise your goods? I’m just going to launch the poll now. Just while that poll runs, thank you to everyone for all your responses.

Just a quick question to Shanker. So we’ve got a couple of questions on categorisation.

So is categorisation new and are there any other support mechanisms out there?

It is new if you’re using the simplified process, and I just refer you to the previous slide, all the things that we can do. There’s also Gov.uk guidance on this. There are tools that you can use to do this. And I think my colleagues might be able to put some links into the chat here to indicate the different tools that can be used, but to really stress that TSS is available and ready to help you with this, with this process.

Great, thanks, Shanker. Yeah, do keep an eye out on the chat for any links that might come up.

Again, I see most people have voted, so give it for another couple of seconds before I shut the poll. So in 3,2,1. And so 55% say they understand their goods classification categorisation, only 17% say no, and 28% say they will benefit from more support on these topics. Shanker, does that surprise you at all? Is that a good thing do you think?

I think that’s quite encouraging that 55% of people already understand this process because it is somewhat new. For those who would want more support that 28% number or indeed the people who are unsure, we’ve got lots of help available for you. But that’s a pretty good starting point I would think.

Brilliant. Thank you, Shanker. At this point, I’d like to bring back Vicky on to camera and hand over the next section of the presentation. Over to you, Vicky Thank you very much. I’m going to go into a little bit more detail on the actual data that you need. In previous webinars we have referred to talking to your supply chain, getting more information. This is where we’re going to go into some more detail of what that information may look like and where you might be able to find it.

So if you go to the next slide, please. Thank you. Internal Market Movement Information or IMMI as you may refer to it, obviously there’s a data set that’s there and required.

Now this is showing the reduced amount of data that is required for the IMMI. This is providing that kind of visual there to just show you the reduced data elements. It’s less than half of the elements are required for the IMMI. So hopefully that will support businesses as well in terms of the information required for this data. So next slide please.

Thank you. So going to spend a little bit of time on here talking around the different elements of information that’s required. As you can see, we’ve got some of the elements listed here that you can obviously read through, and I’ll touch on some of these areas. So just referring to that poll information, I thought that was great that 55% of people understand the way to classify and the categorisation meaning and implementation of that.

I will go through it, like I say a little bit of what that means over these next few slides.

But we will also build on that information and that knowledge for people that are still unsure.

Or, those people that just require that little bit more information as we go through webinars, bulletins and information sharing with you. As discussed on the previous webinar, start the conversations with the supply chain to gather the information required, find out who’s going to be supplying the information and data required or the people that require it off yourselves. So obviously we’re going to have a mixed audience today. So you may sit in a different line within the supply chain. So just understand your position, understand what information you’ve got or require, and obviously make sure that the relevant people have got that information. So, such as commercial information, previous document numbers, locations of goods, that is all required. Depending again on where you sit in the journey, will determine what information you need to obtain or supply. EORI numbers, as an example, will need to be obtained, but remember the UKIMS authorisation holder, that will be the importer for these instances. So that party will need to ensure that they’ve got the relevant EORI numbers available. As a UK Internal Market Scheme Authorisation Holder, you will also need to ensure that you hold the proof that the goods will remain in Northern Ireland. Take that into consideration when you’re deciding who that party will be within the supply chain.

When looking at the information provided as well, don’t just trust the information that’s on the paperwork. Try and educate yourselves to notice if there are any mistakes or issues with the information there that is obvious, in terms of say the commodity codes or the country of origin, and things like that. Make sure you understand what goods are coming in or moving or your involved with, and if there’s anything that doesn’t look right, you need to flag that with the supplier of the information. In terms of things like the goods description, obviously that is important because that will drive all your decision point on what details you’re looking for. So make sure it’s a clear description detailing the goods, as an example, do not make it vague. For example car parts, it can be a variety of items, now we’ve seen these kind of parts and accessories, and things like that, that don’t actually detail what it actually is.

So, taking that example of car parts, it could be the body shell, it could be nuts and bolts, it could be a steering wheel or even an engine.

This will all be significantly different when it comes to allocating the correct commodity code for this, so understanding the detail of the goods will drive the next decision point for you.

Things like T-shirts, you need to understand what the material is. Is it cotton? Is it textile materials? Is it fine animal hair? This can all indicate a different commodity code and take you down a different path of information which you need. Same with non-preferential rules of origin which is an area where you need to understand what it means , what the impact is. Non-preferential origin isn’t necessarily where the goods are shipped from. Your supplier may be in London as an example, but the goods might have actually originated in China, so don’t assume there of GB origin in this instance, you need to make sure you understand where those goods come from.

You may have to do a bit of research, looking into the rules around wholly obtained and last sufficiently processed if you’re unsure. Things like manufacturing processes which may have an impact on the origin as well, so just again, just understand the process behind where the information is coming from and question it if you are unsure.

So, again, the country of origin codes can be misleading in some instances, if your not sure of how the build-up of these codes are. As an example, the country code for CL, which is a 2-digit code, it could be misunderstood to be Colombia.

In fact CL is for Chile and Colombia is CO. Even just that slight change could impact the goods and the data that you’re putting into the systems. Obviously in that instance with the codes, just refer to the International Organisation for Standardisation, ISO. It’s a 2-digit ISO code which actually sets out the Internationally recognised codes. So familiarise yourself or double check the codes as they come in off the information there which are readily available. Once you have the relevant information on the goods, then you can check your commodity code. This obviously then goes into what Shanker just referred to in terms of categorisation, and then you understand that the information is correct, and you clarify it, obviously that’s when you can then move on to the next stage. Next slide please. Now in terms of obtaining that information and where you may find it in the documents, usually you would get it from a commercial invoice and a packing list. Should the invoice not be available; the details of the goods should be agreed and determined whether it’s on a proforma, an invoice, shipping note, order note, something like that, but the detail of that information needs to be readily available.

So obviously you can dicuss this with the supplier, hold the information on file, maybe repeat movements, things like that, that you regularly get in so if you understand the information available youve got that to hand. You don’t have to wait for an invoice to come in all instances. So the packing list, again we’ve separated this out on this slide just as a visual, but they should indicate the number of packages and gross mass of the goods. Now, sometimes it is combined, and it’s consolidated with the invoice or with the proforma etc. Look for the information that’s available to you on the documents. Again, all information should be clear and concise. Sometimes you have handwritten documents. If you’re unsure, question it. As I say, if it’s handwritten documents, some numbers may be different, or it might be a case that people are putting commas instead of dots in values. Just clarify it and what you’re expecting the information to show. So the example shown here again that there are options of how you may get the information. It may be presented to you in different ways. It may even be confirmation like say on a purchase order or something like that. But if you’re unsure, please contact and speak to your customer or supplier and keep communicating with any queries.

Next slide please. In this instance, it’s trying to find the information. You may have to reach out to get the information if you haven’t already. So understanding the correct elements of the supply chain will speed the process up. You’ll see indicated on this slide as well the options in bold on the slide element is the elements of information that can be used on the pre movement information as well. Again, consider whose UKIMS authorisation you’ll be using to ensure relevant information is provided to them and also ensure the correct permission are obtained and set up for the representative making that presentation of information.

Next slide please.

Looking at the data sets, we refer to what Shanker referred to earlier in terms of the Trader Goods Profile. So elements such as the origin, supplementary units, commodity code and goods description will be supported with the Trader Goods Profile.

That’ll hold that information in the process. And if you use this, you need to make sure you’re maintaining that information. Details will be coming up and further information on the Trader Goods Profile over the coming months. Please keep up to date with it and check the information, check what you need to do. But in terms of maintaining that information, obviously any changes that may affect the material of the products, maybe the supplier location moves, manufacturing process might change that may affect and have a knock-on effect to the information that you’ve got at the end. So commodity code, origin, etc. Maintaining that information is crucial to make sure this process works. Again, keep informed of any changes, and any changes will need to be reflected in the Trader Goods Profile. Just some key points off the back of that. Understanding the product, understand your supply chain, have the conversations if you haven’t done it already, check the information provided is correct and what you’re expecting, obtain further information from Gov.uk if need be, on these certain elements. If you need further training, education and things, there’s a lot of material out there that can guide you through how to do this. And obviously, if there’s any unsure areas, you can use the TSS to support any additional questions around this. Next slide, please. Thank you. So I’ll pass back to Phil.

Thank you, Vicky. And so it’s now time for the third of our polls of the webinar, about halfway through now. I’d like to ask you for the information required to complete the IMMI.

Are you confident in where to obtain this information? I’m just going to launch that in a second.

And while that runs, I’d like to welcome Mark on to the presentation. While we are awaiting responses, just a quick question Mark. Mark, we’ve seen the simplified processes and the reduced data, what would you recommend traders do now?

Thanks so much and hello everyone. So probably a couple of things. First is to have a look at some of the guidance that we’ve published quite recently including last week on categorisation. And also, we’ve got a wider page on Internal Market Movement processes, but also i think Vicky underlined it’s really important to get ready by starting to think about what it means for your business and your supply chain. Start having conversations if you haven’t already with the people in your supply chain to understand, where that information sits, how you can work this into your process so you’re benefiting from the simplifications.

And as we’ve been saying, there is less data, there is less information that you need to fill in, but communication is important for optimising those benefits. Brilliant. Thank you Mark. Thank you for those that have voted. Another couple of seconds and I’ll close the poll 3,2,1. I’m just going to share the result with you again.

About 47% of you feel confident. Only 9% say not confident, with 37% saying they’re somewhat confident and 8% saying they need to have supply chain conversations.

Mark, what do you make of this latest poll? A little bit like the last poll I see though as thinking about my kind of readiness role, see that as quite encouraging. It was certainly good to see that 47% think that you’re confident now and 37% somewhat confident is quite good as well.

You know, hopefully the resources like this conversation, like this webinar and some of the guidance we’ve published will help people. But you’re obviously interested to hear, what helps people, what will help people feel more kind of ready, more confident.

Brilliant. Thank you, Mark. And I’m just going to close. Now back to you for the next stage of the presentation.

Thanks very much. So yes, we’re going to talk a little bit more about the Trader Goods Profile, if we can move on to the first slide, please. What is the Trader Goods Profile? It is an online service that is being provided by HMRC with the purpose to support the population of the Internal Market Movement Information and make that process as easy as it possibly can be. As such, it can only be used for goods that are eligible to move under the simplified processes that we’ve been talking about. A Trader Goods Profile is effectively a goods record, a collection of goods records. So for each type of goods, you’ll find the following information, goods description, commodity code, the relevant number of digits, and the product reference you know defined by the trader, the intention of that is so that you’re able to identify and pull down your own goods using a reference that works for you. You’ll have supplementary units for relevant Category 2 goods. And then also in there, there are things like that Vicky mentioned, like the country of origin and the categorisation once you’ve been able to categorise your goods, as we’ve been talking about previously. To access the Trader Goods Profile, you need to be authorised under UKIMS in order to use the service. If we go to the next slide, please.

How do you access the Trader Goods Profile? There are actually a few different ways you can do it. There is a user interface on Gov.uk, there will be an API for those who need it, and of course you’ll be able to access it through the TSS. It will be accessed through your Government Gateway Account. One point that I’ve been asked to mention is that if you need to use the Government Gateway account using the EORI number associated with your UKIMS authorisation. I think when we’ve been testing this service, we’ve seen a small number of businesses sort of wrestling with this slightly, particularly because they have multiple government Gateway accounts and then other reasons why that might be, but it needs to be the EORI number associated with the UKIMS authorisation. Second point to mention is that the EORI number must be enrolled to the Customs Declaration Service. Now it might sound slightly daunting, but there are a couple of ways to do this, and so you can do that now if you look up subscribe to the Customs Declaration Service on Gov.uk, you can find out how to do that. But we will also redirect you to the relevant page when you come to log into the Trader Goods Profile for the first time. So there is time to resolve that.

All traders who were already UKIMS authorised by June 2024,so earlier this summer, we will be prepopulating your Trader Goods Profile based on GB, NI, Great Britain’s Northern Ireland movements that you made. It’s effectively between April 2023 and June 2024. So just over a year’s worth of data. We’ve done that in order to make it as easy as possible, for businesses profile to reflect the goods you typically move and help with readiness ahead of the end of March next year, we will talk about how it works through TSS and how you link your TSS account and the TGP together in a little while. The benefit of doing so is that it will be possible to use the information in the Trader Goods Profile to populate your IMMI while using TSS simply by looking up the relevant reference or the description in the portal. So that we do think that’ll make your life a lot easier. If we go to the next slide, I’ve just got a couple of screenshots here just to demonstrate.

We move to the next slide, please. Thank you. Just a few screenshots here just to illustrate a little bit what the Trader Goods Profile for everyone looks like in the Gov.uk user interface. So on the left-hand side there you can see that the TGP holds information about your UKIMS number, your UKIMS authorisation and also your registration if it’s applicable for the NIRMS and NIPHL schemes. And on the right-hand screenshot there for an example of an actual profile, you can see there, a trader reference and that can hold a descriptor that you wish to define so you can easily identify and locate the types of goods that you’re moving.

People use things like stuff, keeping units, those sorts of things.

There’s then goods description and as Vicky was saying that needs to be specific enough to allow for the identification and classification of the goods, commodity code. One thing to note there, is that it will tell you whether each line IMMI ready or not ready for IMMI. And that’s mostly driven by categorisation. So if the goods are category 1 and can’t be used on the IMMI, that would be visible. But there may also be flags where any information is missing and requires attention. Before I hand back over, I was just going to mention some of the timelines on the Trader Goods Profile. It’s not something you can go into currently, but we do plan to make it available for a sort of public beta form early in the New Year, so businesses can start checking those records and goods lines plenty of time ahead of the end of March timeline. And that was all I was going to say on the Trader Goods Profile. So I think I’m handing it back over to Vicky.

Thank you very much for that, Mark. Good insight there as well. So just a couple of bits now just connecting with what Mark’s just referred to, in terms of how will the Trader Goods Profile work with TSS? So this is where we need to be able to link your TSS account to your HMRC TGP, again using the Government gateway account. So that is important that you need to be able to set that up.

Make sure you’re doing that. None of this will be automated. There will be manual input required from businesses. Once you link your TSS, you can manage your TGP, or Trader Goods Profile via the TSS portal. This is making sure your information is correct; making sure you’ve got the right population of information, and obviously TSS will support the different sources of information management here as well. So we’ll have a Trader Goods Profile management page on the TSS portal and that will act as an interface. So the management page will help you and support you viewing it, adding, deleting, editing all goods on your TGP. Again, making sure the right permissions are set up, will support the supply chain in supporting you filling this information in. It may be that you might want to give all your freight forwarders the right to manage this on your behalf then you need to make sure that the profile and the permission has been set up correctly.

The next slide, please. So yeah, as discussed, the TSS allows a third party to act on your behalf in managing your records if required it is not mandatory. You can do it yourselves, depending on what role you take. To take advantage of the TSS TGP support, you will need to be a TSS user. So obviously that’s important, if you’re not a TSS user today.

Please note it’s not live yet. As Mark referred to, but start having conversations now. And as Mark said, this should be live early 25, so keep up to date with news. Again, we’ll be doing more webinars, more bulletin information and we’ll be providing information on the run up to this support that will be available to you. So I’m going to pass over back to Shanker.

Yes, thank you very much, Vicky. We can go to the next slide, please.

We’re going to show you a couple of trader journeys and see how this works in practise.

So if we go to the next slide.

What we want to do is give you as many options as possible. We’ll support various options that suit you based on those conversations that we see that you’ve been already having with your supply chains, and so you can do the IMMI pre-movement. So all this data that we just talked about; you can submit that before the goods move into Northern Ireland, and if you do that, then there’s nothing you have to do post movement. In other words there’s no supplementary declaration as you do now, etc. Or if it’s better for you in terms of the data that you have and the conversations you’ve had in your supply chain, you can do the IMMI post movement and keep your pre-movement journey as is, and simplify your post movement action. So Instead of doing the supplementary declaration, you do a more simplified data set per the IMMI post movement.. So depending on your particular business and your particular supply chain, you can do either.

You can use the TGP as described before in both cases and that reduces the per movement data entry and both can be part of the TSS integrated journeys, or you can do this in a standalone fashion. Both have portal and API options available to you.

If you go to the next slide. I just wanted to cover these two types of journeys.

There are other journeys we can come to that in future webinars, but for these purposes, we’re going to look at the pre-movement IMMI where you’re submitting the IMMI before the goods move into Northern Ireland. We’ve laid out the journey there, including things that are non TSS process realted things, things that you can use the TSS for, and things that you will be using TSS for, so, Pre-movement, all the things that you would normally do, you continue to do. Then when you raise a goods movement, you’ll be doing that in the TSS in the normal way.

You would be providing your IMMI information before the goods move that is a combined TSS data entry process that includes the raising of the goods movement, the IMMI, and also if you choose to do it the GVMS process as well to obtain the GMR. You can do that as a combined TSS data entry process, the GMR piece and that you can do that directly with GVMS if you want to, but you can do it entirely on the TSS. And then once the goods move, you do the normal booking check in and boarding the ferry as normal, once you have that GMR and then you deliver the goods and there’s nothing else for you to do after that. The second journey, journey B is where you do the normal pre movement processes, raise the goods movement, you do the raising of the goods movement leads to either an EIDR or SFD process. You obtain the GMR. Again, you can do that as part of a TSS process or directly with GVMS. You book, check in and then board the ferry.

You then deliver the goods into Northern Ireland. And the only thing you have to do after that as the importer or receiver of these goods is to do the post movement IMMI, which you can do on TSS as described. You can continue to use the TGP whether you’re doing this pre movement or post movement. That’s a quick sort of tour of the journeys that you have. And if we go to the next slide.

I think we’re now at the point where we can do some Q & A. But just before we move to Q & A, I would like to thank all our speakers, Shanker, Mark and Vicky for the introduction to the simplified processes for Internal Market Movements they have presented.

And also thank all of you in the audience for asking so many questions prior to and during this webinar. Please do remember if you are TSS registered and if you have further questions that have not been answered today within the webinar, we ask you contact the TSS Contact Centre or raise the questions via a case in the TSS portal. If you’re not yet registered with TSS, we encourage you to sign up for this free service so we can support you, if you have any specific questions.

However, it’s now over to the Q & A. I’m just going to pull up some of the questions you’ve sent in, as the first one is for Vicky. Vicky, how do you treat goods which are sold to customers in Northern Ireland for stock? OK. Obviously the first thing you’d have to understand in this instance would be understand what we mean by stock.

There’s several different meanings to that. Is it goods that we could put on a shelf, is it wholesale, is it storage, etcetera. We need to understand what’s happening with those goods and what they are and what they’re going to be used for. Obviously you need to look at what the customer’s going to do with the stock once in Northern Ireland, will it be sold within Northern Ireland? Is it for sale to or final use by the end consumers may be located back in the UK. There’s all sorts of questions that need to be asked first to understand this question. Depending on the products and what’s happening with them, we’ll obviously give you a different answer.

But it determines as well what options are available for stock movement. Are the goods at risk or are the goods not at risk of onward movement to the EU? again, finding out this information will indicate and provide you with further data around that.

This is also going to determine if duty is payable on the goods that you bring into Northern Ireland from Great Britain, how much it is. That’s going to depend again on how you’re declaring your goods not at risk, onward movement at risk, etcetera. But you will not need to pay any duty if the applicable EU rate of duty is zero. So, in this case the goods, if they’re regarded not at risk, you can have a look at all the requirements and things around that. Again, it’s difficult to answer with the single answer on this one because we don’t know what’s happening with the goods, unfortunately. It’s dependent on, as I say, the initial questions, the upfront questions there that you need to ask. Where the applicable EU rate of duty is above zero though, you can still declare your goods and as not at risk and benefit from zero duty if you are on the UKIMS. So again, going back to what we’ve been discussing, need to understand if you’re registered etcetera to be able to take advantage of that. Again, does the customer have the UKIMS authorisations? Can you get the UKIMS authorisation, and do you obtain the records to evidence that the goods are also staying in Northern Ireland? So if yes, then the goods can avail of the simplified processes , obviously referring to this webinar and getting all that knowledge and understanding from the back of that. So again, knowledge is key in this instance.

Thanks, Vicky. We’ve only got a few more minutes left, but we’ll try to get as many of your questions as possible. This next one is to Shanker, about food labelling. We’re hearing lots of conflicting information regarding the ‘not for EU’ labelling and would like clarity, please. Shanker, do you think you can handle that one?

Yes, sure. That is relating to the Northern Ireland Retail Movement Scheme, which is a DEFRA scheme. So first of all I strongly encourage you if you’ve got questions on the NIRMS DEFRA scheme to join, there is something called the Northern Ireland Food forum that DEFRA hosts. It’s every other Thursday morning. And so strongly encourage you to sign yourselves up for that. That’s where all these issues are covered explicitly. I will say that under the NIRMS scheme “not for EU” labelling is required for products that are moving under NIRMS, now there are a number of phases of this. Phase one and phase two labelling covering different types of products. Phase one and Phase two are already in place. There’s quite a lot of guidance on this.

There’s DAERA guidance that is on the DAERA website; that’s the Northern Ireland equivalent of DEFRA. There is Gov.uk guidance on the labels that you are required to provide for GB-NI movements under the NIRMS scheme. And I think we can probably post some of these links in the chat on that. But my strong recommendation is, if you’re moving these types of goods, please do get onto the Northern Ireland Food Forum. And finally, in terms of confusion, just to be very clear, there is no requirement for UK wide, “not for EU” labelling. That was a discussion that’s not going to happen. So don’t worry about that if that’s a concern that’s causing the confusion.

Thank you very much, Shanker. I think this will be the final question because we’re almost at time very quickly from Mark, what is the definition of a parcel when it is deemed to be freight?

Yes, the key thing to mention here is on the Windsor Framework arrangements, if they’re depending on the sender and recipient and there are different processes for business routes and consumer routes, the difference between parcels, consumer parcels have no requirements for individual customs declarations and or safety & security requirements and there are weight limits and effects down that sort of consumer route. So up to 100 kilogrammes per packet for a single item and that’s the kind of white goods and then 31.5 kilogrammes per package if the consignment is made-up of multiple items and you are outside of that and you’re effectively going down the freight route. Business to business parcel movements, they’ll be subject to the same processes as freight from the time of the new Windsor Framework arrangements come into effect.

So whether goods are moving on a pallet or in a parcel, there’ll be no difference. Those movements, a really important kind of take away is that they will be eligible for the simplified processes that we’ve been talking about, subject to the same sort of prerequisite needs to be UKIMS authorised. If you’re using a parcel carrier now, you might not need to use the Trader Support Service. We’ve been talking to parcel operators and some parcel carriers will make arrangements to complete those declarations as part of their door-to-door service.

Our recommendation if you’re one of the people who are affected by this is to speak to your parcel carrier if you move B to B parcels. We’ve been doing quite a bit of outreach from HMRC. We did a webinar last week, but if you’ve got questions, you want more information, we’re putting that online all the time, but we can also be contacted at NI [email protected] if you’ve got any further questions.

Great, Thank you, Mark. So unfortunately, we’re out of time for questions, but thank you very much to everyone who submitted them. On the next slide, we have the HMRC and TSS readiness timeline. Vicky, if you could give a quick overview of what’s been going on.

Yes, no problem. I’ll be very quick on this. But just to indicate obviously you’ll be familiar with this from the past webinar, and we’ll be introducing this in each instance so you can see what we’ve done and what we are doing. So you’ll see there that the ticks indicate the things that have been delivered. So you’ll see there around HMRC comms and guidance. We’ve released information on the Internal Market Movements and comms on the IMMI and categorisation. And in terms of what TSS are doing to support through NICTA and comms updates, we’ve done the Windsor Framework update webinar and the webinar simplified processes today. And also you would have seen TSS bulletins containing further information. So again, you’ll see across this slide the different elements that we’ll be delivering. The next key point here is that we’ve got a haulier webinar which is on the 11th of December, which we’ll be going through haulier specific routes and what details and information you may need to obtain, and what actions you need to take as a haulier. And then moving into New Year, we’ve got the TGP as Mark referred to earlier, more comms and guidance around GVMS and getting ready for March and again supported by TSS in terms of TGP, how to get ready, portal information as well, which is obviously going to be important and obviously future bulletins that we’ve got there.

So again, just reiterating that message on their businesses should be fully prepared with all this activity that’s going on for the new arrangements by the 31st of March 25.

Brilliant. Thank you, Vicky. And for the final slide, you’ll see some information on how you can get further support from Gov.uk and NICTA and TSS, including scannable QR code to the TSS website, and we’ll post these links in the chat view. Please remember that the recording of this webinar will be uploaded to NICTA shortly. NICTA also hosts the TSS Bulletin, which contains important information for TSS users and can be sent via e-mail subscribers.

We’re pleased to also announce a furthermore in-depth Windsor Framework webinar is being released shortly, so please keep an eye out for NICTA and the TSS Bulletin.

Again, if you do have any further specific questions, we ask you contact TSS Contact Centre on the number provided and our agents will do their best to support you. But for now, it’s time for me to thank Vicky, Mark and Shanker for appearing in today’s webinar and for all of you for all your time. I hope you have a lovely day, and I look forward to seeing you at the next webinar. Thanks everyone.