Opportunity for new customs sites within the East Midlands Freeport

The East Midlands Freeport is looking to engage with businesses interested in potentially operating a customs site within the Freeport boundary where businesses can obtain customs benefits through the Freeport Customs Special Procedure.

Freeport customs sites allow access to a range of benefits, including:

• Duty suspension:no duty and import VAT need to be paid on non-GB goods brought into the Freeport customs site until they enter the GB domestic market. This can provide significant cash flow savings.
• Duty flexibility:when declaring goods to the GB market, businesses can choose whether to calculate import duties based on either the finished products or on the imported materials, whichever results in the lowest duty liability.
• Duty exemption:freeport customs sites provide a duty exemption for re-exports of goods imported into the Freeport customs site, meaning no import duties or import VAT will be paid.
• Simplified import procedures:simplified process for declaring goods to the Freeport procedure at import, with no supplementary declarations required, reducing administrative cost and burden.

Businesses currently located within EMF’s outer boundary interested in applying to become a CSO are required to receive EMF Board endorsement before submitting a Registration of Interest with HMRC.

EMF is open to customs sites from a variety of sectors, but would be particularly interested to hear from prospective Customs Site Operators whose business is aligned within the Freeport’s target sectors: advanced logistics & warehousing, advanced manufacturing, low carbon & renewable energy production, and R&D.

More detail on EMF’s Customs Site opportunity can be found within EMF's Customs Brochure, available to download at the link below.

Further detail on the UK Freeport’s Customs regime can be foundhere(link is external) – including HMRC’s requirements and how to apply.

If you’d like to engage with us directly, or have any questions, please contact us using our enquiry form or emailinfo@emfreeport.com(link sends e-mail).