Beer production in the UK (Excise Notice 226)
This notice explains the effects of the law and regulations covering the production, storage and accounting for duty on beer.
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This excise notice will be withdrawn at the beginning of February 2025, and replaced by the alcoholic products technical guide. Until then, you must follow the existing guidance for alcohol production.
Read more about the upcoming changes to alcohol approvals, returns and payments.
If you are applying to register as a brewer or packager and holder of beer, fill in form BPH1 on screen, print it and post it to HMRC.
Updates to this page
Published 29 April 2014Last updated 11 December 2024 + show all updates
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This excise notice will be withdrawn at the beginning of February 2025, and replaced by the alcoholic products technical guide. Until then, you must follow the existing guidance for alcohol production.
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Information about the requirements needed if you want to reprocess the extracted alcohol in section 22.3 have been updated to remove the requirement for a compounder’s licence.
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Section 27.6 has been updated as the Customs Handling of Import and Export Freight (CHIEF) service is being replaced by Customs Declaration Service (CDS).
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Information around changes in ownership in section 3.1.1 has been updated to include details about new owner obligations, what happens to a registration when a company changes ownership and what happens when there are changes to persons with significant control within a limited company.
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Contact information for the National Verification Centre has been updated.
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The alcohol by volume (ABV) calculation in section 7.8 has been updated. Section 19.4.5 has been updated to replace references to 'made-wine' to 'other fermented products. Information has been added to section 8.1.1 to confirm you must apply the Small Producer Relief (SPR) rate from the time the product has been produced and not when the product passes the duty point.
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Section 12 has been updated with more information about labelling and alcoholic strength.
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The address in sections 6.5 and 15.3 has been updated.
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The way you work out duty due has changed. Section 8 has been updated with information about small producer alcoholic products. Information has also been added for the changes to legislation.
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Information has been added about the changes to Alcohol Duty from 1 August 2023. Section 8 has been updated to include details about the transition from Small Brewer Relief to Small Producer Relief. Section 12 has been updated to explain the changes for working out alcoholic strength and section 18 has been updated to explain the changes when mixing small producer beer.
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Information has been added about the changes to Alcohol Duty from 1 August 2023.
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Sections 8.22, 24 and 24.4 have been updated to reflect the new process for moving duty paid goods between Northern Ireland and the EU.
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How to calculate your reduced rate of duty has been updated in sections 8.25, 8.26 and 8.27.
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Payment method ‘approve a payment through your online bank account’ has been added to paragraph 16.5 ‘How to pay’.
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Section 6.2 has been updated to clarify that a movement guarantee is always needed for imports and exports of beer to or from brewery registered premises.
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Sections 3.1, 3.7, 4.5 and 5,5 have been updated with information about a change of business ownership.
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'Small brewery beer export declaration' template added.
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The section 'Procedures for duty suspended importations' has been updated with information on how to import beer from outside the UK to your registered premises.
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The postal address for HMRC Excise Processing Teams has been updated.
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Excise Notice 226:Beer Duty, section 8.5 on Connected Breweries has been updated.
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This guidance has been updated because the Brexit transition period is over.
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We have updated the telephone number under section 15.3, 'What happens if I do not submit a Beer Duty return'.
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This notice has been updated to remove any reference to the EX46 paper Beer Duty return. From 1 November, paper returns are no longer being sent. The EX46 return can be submitted online. The process for certifying production volumes for exports of small brewery beer has changed – see paragraph 8.24 and section 36.
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General excise enquiries should now be sent to the Excise Enquiries Team.
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This notice has been updated at paragraphs 4.5, 6.5 and 15.3 to show a new postcode for the Beer Duty Accounting Centre.
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New requirement to notify of change to partner or director details, new address for CITEX Written Enquiries Team, new telephone number for HMRC Orderline and change to duty calculations based on 2017 duty rates.
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Paragraph 3.1 has been updated to inform businesses that it’s their responsibility to check that the wholesaler they buy from is approved by HMRC.
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Alcohol duty rates in paragraph 7.7, 16.1 and 16.2 has been updated. The method for calculating duty on mixed packs has been amended at paragraph 7.8. At paragraph 34.6 'Customs Hotline' has been amended to 'Fraud Hotline'. Fraud Hotline telephone and address has been updated.
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Telephone number at paragraph 15.3 has changed.
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Changes to paragraphs 4.5 and 5.5 to inform that new application may take up to 45 working days to process and changes to current registration may take up to 15 working days.
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The postal address has changed, paragraphs 1.2, 4.3, 4.5, 5.4, 5.5, 6.3 and 9.23 have been updated to reflect changes effective from December 2016.
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This notice cancels and replaces Notice 226 February 2016. Details of any changes to the previous version can be found in paragraph 1.2 of this notice.
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This notice cancels and replaces Notice 226 December 2014. Details of any changes to the previous version can be found in paragraph 1.2 of this notice.
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Multiple amendments to the html attachment.
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First published.