A large importer of military equipment approached Charlton House in 2006 to assist with their negotiations with Customs following receipt of a duty demand.

The duty demand related to a fast patrol boat that had been imported into Germany from Kuwait and then transported overland to the UK for a refit. Following the refit which took over two years, the boat was re-exported and no export paperwork had been lodged with either the UK or German authorities.

The UK authorities had therefore raised a substantial duty demand for the unpaid duty on the entire boat.

Charlton House was able to recreate the records pertaining to the movement and repair of the vessel. There then followed a period of negotiation with both the German and UK authorities to satisfy them that the goods had been re-exported from the European Union. The duty demand was duly withdrawn.

“Groom & Partners (now Charlton House) approached a major UK car parts distributor in 2007 with a view to conducting a customs duty review.

We were aware that the company imported a range of products used to measure certain components of exhaust gases so that they could optimise the performance of the vehicle in which they were installed.

Despite the fact that a ruling already existed in Germany which classified the items as smoke analysers, we believed that the items were more akin to component parts on the basis of their circuitry and also their proximity to the Engine Management System (EMS). With the assistance of the importer, the team took the matter to UK Tribunal in 2008 and successfully argued that the goods were indeed components. The importer has successfully reclaimed all of the duty overpaid in the past.”

Charlton House approached a major UK camera distributor in 2006 with a view to conducting a customs duty review.

The importer distributed vehicle reversing aid products which consisted of a series of cameras feeding into a monitor on the vehicle’s dashboard. The importer had classified the entire supply to the camera heading attracting relatively high rates of duty.

We believed that the supply consisted of two products (cameras and a single monitor) having equally specific classifications. In our opinion however, it was the monitor that gave the goods their ‘essential character’ and on this basis, we reclassified the entire supply to the corresponding duty free heading.

The importer now uses a duty free heading to import these parts and has successfully reclaimed the duty overpaid in the past.