AI Customs Blog

The Real Reason You Are Stuck

If you cannot file a UK customs declaration yet, the reason is almost always the same: you do not have CDS access. The Customs Declaration Service is now the only system for UK import and export entries, since CHIEF closed. Without registration, filing is simply not possible.

What Registration Actually Involves

Registration links your business identity, your GB EORI number, and your payment method inside HMRC's system. It takes four steps in order: a business Government Gateway account, a UTR, a GB EORI, and the CDS subscription. You can follow each step in this guide to registering for CDS in the UK.

The Steps and Their Waits

Government Gateway: same day

UTR: around 10 working days by post

GB EORI: minutes, up to a week

CDS subscription: usually 2 hours

Why People Get Stuck Longest

The UTR is the slow part because it comes by post. Request it first and the rest moves quickly around it. Most agents finish within two weeks.

One Common Trap

Do not apply for CDS before your EORI is active. That is the top reason applications get rejected, and it resets your progress.

The Job Quietly Changed

Ask someone what a clearing agent does and they might still picture paperwork. The reality moved on. Since the Customs Declaration Service replaced CHIEF, every UK entry is built from structured data elements following the UK Trade Tariff data model. The skill is no longer filling boxes. It is keeping data consistent.

What Consistency Actually Means

An entry covers the parties, the goods, transport, valuation, and the customs procedure, and HMRC checks that all of it agrees. A commodity code that clashes with the description, a value that differs from the invoice, a procedure code pair that contradicts the goods movement, any of these gets the entry queried or rejected. The people doing this well treat every declaration like a record that has to pass validation, which is exactly the mindset behind this Freight Forwarder's Guide to UK Customs.

The Upside of the Shift

Data jobs can be automated in the right places. Software now validates entries before submission, helps assign commodity codes, and catches the classic errors on screen instead of at the border. Clean data can clear almost instantly, so the agents who embraced the shift are simply faster than the ones still working like it is the CHIEF era.

What It Is

AEO status is an EU-wide certification issued by Revenue Ireland to traders meeting standards in customs compliance, financial solvency and supply chain security.

Why It's Worth Applying

Certified businesses see fewer examinations, faster clearance, and recognition across the EU and mutual recognition countries like Japan, the USA and China. Full detail in the AEO status Ireland compliance guide.

The Three Types

AEO-C for simplified declarations, AEO-S for supply chain security recognition, AEO-F for both combined.

What Happens Before Approval

Revenue audits records and may visit your site. In return, holders see lower examination rates and reduced port dwell time.