Summary of movements of goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain 2021

Question 1

1. Key insights

Accepted Answer

In the year 2021, just over 1 million full declarations were cleared by HMRC for movements of goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain:

950,000 full declarations were facilitated by the Trader Support Service (TSS)
90,000 full declarations were declared directly to the Customs Declaration Service (CDS)

The number of unique businesses associated with these full declarations was 10,400:

9,900 businesses were associated with full declarations that were facilitated by the TSS
1,100 businesses were associated with full declarations that were submitted directly to CDS

These figures do not sum to the overall number of unique businesses, as some businesses were associated with full declarations submitted both directly to CDS and others via the TSS.

Table 1: Full declarations cleared by HMRC in 2021 for movements of goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain, with associated value and business count, split by TSS and CDS routing

Declaration route	No. of Full Declarations	No. of Businesses	Value (£b)
Trader Support Service (TSS)	950,000	9,900	11.1
Customs Declaration Service (CDS)	90,000	1,100	1.3
Total	1,040,000	10,400	12.4

Source: HM Revenue & Customs - Management information extracted from the Customs Declaration Service (CDS) administrative data source in May 2022

Table notes:

Figures in Table 1 have been rounded: number of Full Declarations to the nearest 10 thousand, number of Businesses to the nearest 100, and Value to the nearest £100 million
Number of Businesses in each sub group will not sum due to rounding, and because some businesses are associated with full declarations submitted both directly to CDS, and others via the TSS. As these businesses appear in both groups, the unique total of businesses was calculated separately, and businesses only counted once.
Number of Businesses is defined as the count of unique Economic Operators Registration and Identification (EORI) numbers associated with the cleared declarations
Items on a declaration with a value greater than £100 million were excluded in an attempt to remove likely erroneous entries and extreme outliers from this release. Any items remaining on the declaration have not been excluded.

Question 2

2. Data notes and understanding

Accepted Answer

The following section details how the underlying administrative data was extracted. To be classed as a movement of goods into NI from GB, all of the following nested criteria needed to be met:

The movement was declared to CDS, either directly or via the TSS.
The clearance date of the declaration was between 1st January 2021 and 31st December 2021.
The declaration contained the additional information (AI) code NIDOM, depicting a domestic movement of goods into NI from GB
The country of dispatch was GB.
The Port of Entry was a NI based port (unless goods are leaving inward processing or customs warehousing and entering free circulation where a port is not required).
The declaration was a full declaration.
The value of the goods item on a declaration was less then £100 million (this was a quality assurance measure to exclude the vast majority of erroneous entries and outliers from this administrative data source).

Question 3

3. Data caveats and limitations

Accepted Answer

Clearance date was used to define the calendar year of 2021:
- The clearance date of a declaration was used to select declarations from the 2021 annual period. Declarations that were not cleared in 2021 were excluded from this analysis.
- The definition of this data is therefore “Full declarations cleared by HMRC between 1st January 2021 and 31st December 2021 for movements of goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain”.
Simplified Frontier Declarations (SFD) were excluded:
- SFDs were excluded from this analysis to avoid duplication of data that was submitted on both the SFD and the subsequent supplementary declaration.
Parcel and postal movements are not included:
- In almost all cases, goods sent from GB as parcel or postal movements to consumers in NI will not require a customs declaration. Declarations will only usually be required where the goods are either prohibited or restricted or are being sent from one business to another business where the value of the good is greater than £135.
- HMRC has adopted this temporary approach to applying declaration requirements for the movement of goods in parcels (including by the Royal Mail Group and express carriers) since 1st January 2021. More details can be found in the Sending parcels to and from Northern Ireland guidance.
- Whilst not required, business may choose to voluntary produce and submit declarations for these types of movements, which would appear in the administrative data used in this release.
Impact of Customs Warehousing and Inward Processing:
- Declarations for goods exiting a Customs Warehouse (CW) or Inward Processing (IP) and entering free circulation do not contain data for the original port of entry.
- To mitigate this, where these declarations include the NIDOM additional information code, the country of dispatch was GB, and the Customs Procedure Code (CPC) denotes the movement as coming out of CW or IP, then these declarations were assumed to be a movement into NI from GB.
- Data also includes declarations for goods both entering and exiting a Customs Warehouse, with the potential for more than one declaration being submitted for a single consignment of goods.
Figures are provisional and may be subject to change:
- Figures will remain static if the underlying declarations data recorded on CDS at the given date of extraction does not change. For this release, the management information for the calendar year 2021 was extracted in May 2022.
Other data caveats:
- Entry and exit location codes used within this release may not have equivalent trade data available in other trade in goods publications.
- Declarations that were pre-lodged but subsequently invalidated have not been included because HMRC was not notified that the goods had entered Northern Ireland.
- Entry Summary declarations (ENS) do not feature in this release as they are not submitted to CDS.
- Any declarations that have been raised but not cleared between 1st January 2021 and 31st December 2021 have not been included in this release.

Question 4

4. Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

Accepted Answer

Does HMRC hold data on NI movements from GB before January 2021?
- No, the collection of data for goods moving into NI from GB has only been required since 1st January 2021 as part of the Northern Ireland Protocol (NIP) and end of the Transition Period.
Why are HMRC not publishing information on NI movements to GB?
- HMRC only collects a relatively small number of declarations for NI movements to GB, for instance, where controlled goods are being moved. Given the low level of data collection, summary statistical information would not be informative or useful for users.
Can I compare the published NI movements from GB data against the Broad Economy Sales and Exports Statistics (BESES) survey data published by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA)?
- Users should not compare the BESES survey data published by NISRA and the data in this release.
- The BESES survey is a National Statistics release produced by NISRA, based on an annual survey of local businesses’ sales to markets outside Northern Ireland. Due to methodological differences, including collection methodology, timeliness and coverage differences, the BESES survey and this summary of movements of goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain are not directly comparable.

Question 5

5. Terms and definitions

Accepted Answer

Terms used within this release:

Businesses
- A business or individual using an Economic Operators Registration and Identification (EORI) number to engage with customs procedures in the movement of goods into Northern Ireland (NI) from Great Britain (GB).
Country of dispatch
- The country from which the goods have been exported, depicted by a 2 digit alpha code e.g. GB.
Clearance date
- The date when the customs authority releases the goods having carried out whatever checks they deemed necessary.
Customs Declaration Service (CDS)
- CDS records the information collect from customs declarations and has been introduced to replace CHIEF by 31st March 2023.
Customs Procedure Codes (CPC)
- The customs procedure codes (CPCs) identify the customs and/or excise regimes which goods are being entered into and removed from (where this applies).
Customs Warehousing
- A customs facilitation that allows businesses to store goods with duty or import VAT payments suspended, until such goods are either released into free circulation, re-exported or moved to another customs procedure.
Declaration
- A declaration is an electronic submission of data which provides legally required information about the goods being imported.
- A full declaration has been defined as one of the following declaration types: Standard customs declaration, Supplementary declaration, Supplementary declarations for Entry in Declarants Records.
Inward Processing
- A customs facilitation that allows businesses to delay or reduce import duties or VAT on goods that are being processed or repaired.
NIDOM
- An additional information statement that is to be declared for every goods item on a declaration of goods into NI from GB where goods have UK Domestic goods status. This excludes movements to NI from UK Special Fiscal Territories.
Northern Ireland port
- The following ports have been defined as ports based in NI:
  - Belfast (BEL & LCA),
  - Belfast International Airport (BFS),
  - Coleraine (CLR),
  - George Best Belfast City Airport (BHD),
  - Irish land boundary (ILB),
  - Larne (BEL),
  - Londonderry (LDY),
  - Portrush (CLR),
  - Warrenpoint (WPT).
Trader Support Service (TSS)
- The TSS was introduced by HMRC on 1st January 2021. The service is free to use and acts as a customs intermediary to assist businesses in meeting the new legal requirement to complete customs declarations for movements of goods between NI and GB.