Andrew Needham looks at the Import One-Stop Shop system introduced by the EU from July 2021.
Business-to-customer (‘B2C’) sales of goods to the EU can be dealt with in one of two ways, which are at the choice of the supplier.
Under the first method, the supplier can zero-rate their supply to their customer, and the customer accounts for VAT at the time of importation. This is simple for the supplier, but the customer has increased complications and may end up with an unexpected cost of additional VAT or duty on top of the purchase price. Some postal operators and couriers also charge a handling fee to cover the costs of dealing with import documentation, etc. The goods are also not released to the customer until all the fees are paid. This can result in the customer refusing to accept the package in question because of the additional costs.
The second method is a simplification measure introduced by
