In this update, is explained how you can report an incident that happens during your transit journey once NCTS5 is introduced.
What is changing
NCTS5 will introduce an Office of Incident role to record details of any incidents that occur during the transit journey, for example a change of vehicle or damage to security seals. From 30 November 2023, any incident that occurs during the journey must be reported to the nearest Office of Incident so it can be recorded into NCTS.
NCTS5 also removes the requirement to carry a paper Transit Accompanying Document (TAD), unless it is requested by the haulier at the Office of Departure. HMRC will tell you more about this in a future update, but this means that from 30 November 2023, even if the haulier is carrying a paper TAD, you will no longer be able to record an incident manually on the TAD.
Incidents must be reported at the time of occurrence, and you’ll no longer be able to wait until arrival at the authorised destination to notify HMRC about incidents that happened during the journey.
What is an Office of Incident?
Currently customs offices have specific Transit roles which can be any combination of the following: –
• Office of Departure – handles formalities and release of a movement at the start of the transit procedure
• Office of Transit – records the entry of a movement into that Offices’ customs territory, at its border
• Office of Destination – handles formalities upon a movement’s arrival and the goods release.
From 30 November 2023 the role of Office of Incident will be used to record the details of incidents that occur during the transit journey and notify the Office of Departure and the trader at departure, as required.
In the UK all Offices of Departure, Destination and Transit locations will carry out Office of Incident functions.
The Office of Incident will record the details in NCTS, notify the Office of Departure and decide if the transit movement can continue its journey.
• Where the transit movement cannot continue, the Office of Incident will act as Office of Destination and carry out all arrival formalities there.
• Where the Office of Incident decides that the transit movement can continue, the journey can resume as planned
When an incident is registered, a notification will be issued electronically to the person who made the departure Transit declaration. This will either be via their NCTS5 compatible software, or via the NCTS web portal if used. The notification will include all details of the incident such as the location and any additional relevant details such as transport changes, transhipment and seal changes.
What you need to do
From 30 November 2023, if an incident occurs during a transit movement, you will need to report the details immediately to the nearest customs office. You can find a list of customs offices on the Europa website.
The reasons why you need to take action and report an incident have not changed.
The person responsible for moving the goods (such as the haulier) must present them, together with the MRN for the declaration, to the nearest customs office (who will act as Office of Incident) in the territory the means of transport is located.
You can find further information about reasons for reporting an incident in the Transit Manual Supplement.
Next update
HMRC’s next update in March will tell you how to Draft, Save, Retrieve and Amend a declaration when using the updated free-to-use Web Portal for NCTS5.
You can find all our NCTS5 updates on gov.uk.