Switch to NCTS no problem for Impatex users

The switch to HMRC's NCTS (New Computerised Transit System) regime on July 1st presented no problems for users of the Impatex Customs Manager system, which was geared up for the switchover 12 months ahead of the deadline.

NCTS is the new system under which goods moving within the EU must now be reported electronically, replacing the current hard-copy Transit Documents. The use of NCTS became mandatory from July 1st.

Customs Manager's system handles all aspects of NCTS: its Visual Broker Import DTI module covers NCTS "arrivals" and "transhipments", while "departures" are managed through Customs Manager's Visual NES module. For airfreight users, Customs Manager uniquely links direct to the CCS-UK Inventory, so transhipments are "pulled" across to initiate the new NCTS Departure Message - avoiding the re-keying of all data into the HMRC web site or other third-party software.

For seafreight users, for whom there is no parallel message-based community inventory, "arrivals" and "departures" are quickly entered into the Customs Manager system and then transmitted to EDCS, with the aid of stored default data. Non-transit "departures" are entered using Visual NES, and sent to EDCS with the NES message if required.

Says Impatex MD Peter Day: "We rolled out our NCTS functions a full year ahead of the deadline, to ensure the system would be fully tried and tested by the time NCTS became mandatory. Many of our customers were already successfully using Customs Manager for their NCTS processing, so July 1st came and went without incident. Even those of our users who switched over on July 1st did so without problems.

"Although HMRC has provided a web-based solution, this is not really designed for high volume users. It cannot link with external systems and so will require online re-inputting of all data. Also, because the web solution is online, users must wait for the response before processing another message, which can be very time-consuming.

"With our software, users can proceed with all entries, and simply look up those that failed, correct them and re-transmit. All in all, submitting NCTS messages via our software to EDCS is faster and more reliable than using the HMRC web service, and a much more realistic option for agents who have to comply with NCTS on a commercial basis."

Impatex has supplied Customs processing systems since 1979, and pioneered 'Intelligent' DTI in 1983 to coincide with the introduction of FCP80 for the Felixstowe ocean community. The Impatex multi-modal Customs Manager software uniquely interfaces with all the DTI Communities - CCS-UK, CNS, Dover and MCP. The system comprises 9 modules covering DTI, ERTS, NES, NCTS, CFSP, Warehousing, OPR, IPR and Intrastats - all automatically validated against the full HM Customs Tariff which is updated monthly. Customs Manager is in use by hundreds of UK multi-modal freight forwarding companies of all sizes - including most of the major multi-nationals - together with many importers and exporters.