Brexit “Check, Change, Go”

The government today launched a £90 million public in­for­ma­tion cam­paign providing post-Brexit guid­ance, with ad­verts car­ry­ing a ‘check, change, go’ strapline, di­recting peo­ple and busi­nesses to an on­line checker tool that will tell them how to pre­pare for the UK leaving the EU in December.

It comes as more than £700mil­lion is to be spent on build­ing in­fra­struc­ture, hir­ing staff and de­vel­op­ing tech­nol­ogy to en­sure bor­der sys­tems are fully op­er­a­tional at the end of the year.

Busi­nesses plan­ning to ex­port or im­port to or from the EU will be told to en­sure they have reg­is­tered with the rel­e­vant cus­toms au­thor­ity and taken the necessary actions, to prepare for the end of the transition in five months.

It is critical that businesses understand what their post-transition requirements will be, as the government has advised, ignorance will not be a defence in January 2021, supply chains will simply stall.

There has been plenty of public discussions on Brexit impacting Incoterms and origin of goods, but without preparation businesses will be unable to identify the potential pitfalls.

The UK’s post-Brexit border regime will come into place over three stages next year, with most businesses able to delay filing customs declaration until July.

The the right to defer import entries is most definitely conditional and it is vital that businesses check now that they can qualify.

Metro can guide businesses through their 2021 supply chain requirements and provide a health check, so that businesses can assess their requirements.

There will be significant changes from the 31st December.

Ensure that you know what directly affects you and where you should be prepared for adjustments to your current operational process.

The government has said that the £705mil­lion bor­der in­vest­ment will help business to man­age the changes and seize the op­por­tu­ni­ties when the tran­si­tion ends.

The pack­age in­cludes £235mil­lion for staffing and IT, and £470mil­lion for port and in­land in­fra­struc­ture.

This is in effect the final warning from the government, for business to prepare.

Contact your Metro representative to see how we can help you ensure your business is compliant for January 2021, ignorance will not be a defence, preparation now will ensure smooth transition.