10 October 2017 
Amanda Darley, Head of Operations and Engagement
BUFDG has been asked to support an approach to HMRC to request a ruling/exception to their current policy regarding the new rules for simplified import preference procedures [such as Inward Processing Relief (IPR)]. The request will be for an HE sector exemption from the HMRC imposed annual limit on the number of import entries under simplified import preference procedures.
We have been advised that HMRC imposed a limit on the number of SI Procedure entries due to abuse by commercial traders who should have been obtaining full IPR authorization. Universities do not actually trade in goods and so are not able to accurately plan or determine the number or value of imports in any given period. Therefore, we are not seeking to avoid Customs authorisations for known trading activities. It appears that we are caught by a limit which was actually meant to deal with a problem caused by others.
Therefore, to make a decision on taking this forward, we would like to gather information to establish whether or not there is a real concern regarding the SI Procedure limit in the HE sector, including the impact that it is currently having and potentially may have post Brexit. I would be grateful if you could please complete our short survey to provide some information about your institution’s imports and use of simplified import preference procedures.
We can then assess whether approaching HMRC would be beneficial to the wider HE sector.
The link to the survey is here.
