Coronavirus – Freight Update. 1st April 2020

Due to the Coronavirus outbreak, freight and shipping are a constantly moving picture at the moment. If you have missed the daily posts on LinkedIn this week, we’re bringing you a weekly roundup on our blog to help your business. If you are not following us on LinkedIn – please find us here

The areas we’re covering in relation to freight and Coronavirus:

1. Trucks in Europe
2. Air Freight Update
3. Free online workshops
4. Sea Freight Update
5. Video consultation with Independent Freight

Trucks in Europe:

Road Freight Update: to and from Europe. Whilst it is possible to move freight around by road, this is an ever-changing picture by the day, with severe delays on some of the borders between EU states.

As always – we suggest at this time to plan your schedules more than ever and talk to our team to help you minimise delays where possible.

One example of current delays: according to information from the Slovak Government Authorities, Slovakia is currently closing its borders with the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Austria, to freight vehicles over 7.5 tonnes, due to bottlenecks and resulting traffic jams which have accumulated since Monday morning at the Hungarian borders. If you need to discuss road freight, please call us to look at your best options.

Air Freight Update:

Air freight up-date – it’s still possible to move freight by air, but it’s more difficult than you may normally be used to…

There is an acute shortage of lift at a time of high demand due to the majority of carriers closing down or making big cuts in their passenger networks. To help address the needs of our customers we are working closely with our long-term carrier partners. At an unpredictable time, we are unable to hold lead times at their applicable rate, alternatively, charter space will be offered at the market rate when available.

This situation is constantly evolving and our team is keeping up to date with the latest information. If you need any specific information more help or advice about your air freight shipments then give us a call.

Sea Freight Update

Sea Freight is still operational:

In most cases, ports and transport providers are maintaining normal working conditions. Capacity is being reduced by some carriers, however, we can support your business on most of the major freight shipping lanes. Equipment and vessel space shortages are being experienced in the UK for export but we are working with all carriers and Customers to overcome these issues.

Manufacturing in China has broadly returned to normal as have a number of other Asian countries.

Shipping to the USA and Canada is still operational. Some ports are operating at shorter working hours and prioritising medical goods, but there is no real issue in getting freight into the country.

Europe – expect some delays at Italian ports due to reduced staffing levels.

If you need any help planning sea freight, call us or contact us.

Free Online Workshops and Calls with Independent Freight

We recognise that this is a stressful time for you, so we’re running workshops online to help you plan and learn more about customs and freight. We’re finalising content and will announce that soon.

We are also offering a free freight consultation via video – we understand that you may have a lot of burning questions that would like answered, so please get in touch – we’re here to help you and your business at this time.

If you need any further help and support or have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us to find out more about our workshops or a free consultation.

To assist clients in the event of a Customs Audit, we have highlighted below some of the key documents and information HMRC will want to see in order to check that declarations have been undertaken correctly and to prove that there is a clear audit trail.

The main areas of compliance that HMRC will want to examine are:

1. Evidence of export
2. Tariff classification
3. Origin and preferential origin (import)
4. Preference (export)
5. Customs valuation
6. Use of special procedures such as Inward or Outward Processing etc

For Import Audits: HMRC will want to be able to see a full Audit Trail, to ensure that:

The custom value used is correct and includes any additional costs that should be factored in, that the commodity codes used to declare the goods are right, that the correct VAT and Duty has been paid. In order to examine this, HMRC will want to see purchase orders, commercial invoices, proof of payment, insurance policies, evidence of Incoterms used and currency arrangements. They will also want to see the Transport Documents and most importantly Customs Entry Document C88/E2 and C79 Vat reclaims.

They will also want to see the Transport Documents and most importantly Customs Entry Document C88/E2 and C70 Vat reclaims. HMRC will examine how a business has chosen its customs representative if they have outsourced the declarations to a broker or freight forwarder. Have the given authority to the broker to act on their behalf through a Direct Representation Letter, does the Agent have AEO (C) status, which means they have been audited by HMRC. Therefore HMRC may also want to see what instructions are being sent to Agents when conducting customs clearances on behalf of your business and what checks are carried out and how errors are acted upon.

Post Brexit from January 2021 customs will affect all shipments to and from the EU – therefore it is very important to ensure you are doing this correctly.

If you need any further help and support or have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact David@hooperandco.com or David@independent-freight.com who can provide an initial 1-hour review to discuss this with you in more detail. Please also note that now is good opportunity to access the Government Grants available to support businesses that need training in customs matters, to access these grants business must be established in, or have a branch in, the UK when the grant is paid and must have previously met all its tax obligations.

Call us to obtain a free quotation on:  +44(0)2476 343037

A brief summary of 2019 – focusing on the Brexit process now that the General Election has taken place.

• The Conservatives Government won the General Election with a large Majority on the 12th of December.
• This will most probably mean the Withdrawal Bill is passed before the end of the Month.
• We should then leave the EU on the 31st Jan 2020.

• Although we leave the EU there will then be a 12 months transition period where nothing will change as such.
• This will mean that business have 12 months to prepare for Brexit.
• There is an option to extend the Transition period by a further 1-2 years – if by June 2020 negotiations for a future Deal before the end of Dec 2020 are looking unlikely.
• However, as we now go to press the PM has announced that there will be a new Bill which rules out an extension to the Transition period.

Following on from this, the likely outcome is a pretty basic trade deal with the EU which will be implemented at the end of Jan 2021.

However, we now appear to have a timeline and a framework for what trade will look like with the EU, over the next 12 months we will continue to send out blogs updating our customers and providing them with more information on how to ship goods to other international markets, such as the USA and Canada, the Far East, Middle East, South America, Africa and Asia…



Whatever you need to transport and wherever it needs to go, Independent Freight can meet your freight challenge. Some of our core services include:

• Sea Freight
• Road Freight
• Customs Clearance
• International Customs
• Project Management Consultancy

The key to our success is the competence of our staff. Whether you are new to importing or exporting we go out of our way to make sure that your shipment moves completely to plan.