Universal Customs Clearance acquires links for Liverpool and Teesport

Universal Customs Clearance acquires customs links for Liverpool and Teesport

In the last week, Universal Customs Clearance have obtains links for the Ports of Liverpool and Teesport, meaning that we can now process your inventory-linked customs clearances in these locations.

Along with the growth in demand for customs clearance in Teesport over the last decade, Liverpool is also a keen area of interest for traders in the north of England, with Peel Ports looking to invest £140m to drive container freight market share up in the next few years.

The additional badges at Liverpool and Teesport allow us to better serve our customers as Brexit deals open up the North of England to more container trade deals, alongside our U.K. wide T1 (including authorised consignor) and GVMS services that continue to benefit our EU trading customers.

What is the difference between inventory and non-inventory customs clearance?

Inventory-linked clearances mean that the clearance is attached to a registered entry on another system. For containers arriving in a seaport, this is a Unique Consignment Number (UCN) that has been created against the manifest for each vessel. If the UCN has not been cleared by customs, released by the carrier, and approved for removal by any inspecting authorities, then the haulier will be unable to collect the unit from the port.

A non-inventory-linked customs clearance does not use a UCN during the initial declaration process, but might be allocated one retrospectively. For imports, a non-inventory (phase 1) clearance can be used if there are additional declarations to be made on a UCN that has already cleared, or if your consignment is entering through a non-inventory port. If the declaration needs to be matched against another system after clearance, then a pre-notification will be used instead of a live entry.

Export customs clearances are nearly always processed as non-inventory declarations, with the carrier matching the Declarant Unique Consignment Reference (DUCR)
being matched to the manifest by the carrier after the unit, seal, and other details have been ascertained. The carrier will make the entry live once the vessel embarks.

For GVMS clearances, the import and export clearances will be matched to the Goods Movement Record (GMR) as pre-notifications. These will then be processed as live once the GMR is updated to “Embarked”.

What happens if a clearance is processed non-inventory instead of inventory?

If one of your shipments has been processed without a UCN in error, don’t worry. We can still clear your UCN for you so that your unit can be collected. The taxes will have already been calculated and paid on your initial clearance, so there will be no further duty and Vat to pay.

However, port systems allocate customs clearance, security, infrastructure, and other fees (depending on the port) to the UCN, so these will be incurred and passed on.

Do you need customs clearances in Liverpool or Teesport?

Universal Customs Clearance provide import and export customs clearances, T1 Forms and GVMS services across the U.K., and have recently expanded our team to meet the rise in demand for our services.

If you need help with customs clearance in Liverpool, Teesport, or anywhere else in the U.K., please contact one of our experts for assistance.