Implementation of NCTS5 Final State rules and downtime

The transition from NCTS5 Transitional State to NCTS5 Final State, in Northern Ireland (NI) and Great Britain (GB), will take place on 21 January 2025.

Some providers of commercial software will be switching their software version from NCTS5 Transitional State to NCTS5 Final State, and they should be contacting their clients to confirm when this will take place. However, it is recommended that businesses proactively check with their providers in advance of 21 January 2025.

Monday 20 January 2025 to Tuesday 21 January 2025:

The XI service will be unavailable from 22:00 on 20 January to 00:15 on 21 January GMT (Greenwich Mean Time).

The GB service will be unavailable from 23:00 on 20 January to 00:15 on 21 January GMT (Greenwich Mean Time)

Important:

For Departures, the movement must reach at least ‘Accepted’ status before the above start times.

If the movement is still in the ‘Submitted’ status when the service becomes unavailable, the customs office will need to reject the movement once the system becomes available as it will not progress any further.

While NCTS is down, you should refrain, where possible, from moving goods under the Normal procedure which requires attending Inland Border Facilities (IBFs) or ports to start movements.

If you must move goods and have been unable to submit the declarations prior to the start of system downtime, you will be able to use the existing manual fallback procedure, although we recommend you do not travel to an Inland Border Facility (IBF) to start a transit movement until the system is available. You can find the manual fallback process in the Transit Manual Supplement.

For Arrivals, movements are unaffected and should be able to progress from all statuses.

If you require urgent support during this time, please contact: -

• NCTS Helpdesk - ncts.helpdesk@hmrc.gov.uk or 0300 322 7095
• NCTS Supervising Office - isbc.nctssupervisingoffice@hmrc.gov.uk or 0300 322 9452.

Please look out for our webinar on 7 January 2025 where we will cover the downtime and business continuity subjects above in more depth.

You can join the webinar using the following link: -

NCTS5 Webinar 7 - Tuesday 7th January 2025 at 10.00 hrs

HMRC will issue communications and update our service availability page to confirm when each service has successfully gone live.