Intrastat changes as from 2022: Nature of transaction codes & Harmonized System

Nature of transaction

The ‘Nature of transaction’ field within Intrastat declarations refers to the nature of the underlying agreement of the movement of goods. The breakdown by nature of transaction is necessary to determine whether there is economic transfer of ownership and financial compensation.

The new nature of transaction codes must be reported in customs declarations as from January 1, 2022 and in intra-Community trade reports as from reporting month January 2022. For foreign trade statistics reporting, use the nature of transaction codes within the items in the financial data overview. Customs authority automatically transmits them from your export and import declarations to the national institute.

Translating existing nature of transaction codes to the new codes for reporting can be challenging for companies. As of reporting period January 2022, you must fill in the second digit of the transaction code in addition to the first digit. This must be differentiated depending on the business transaction. The new nature of transaction codes are defined in EU Regulation 2020/1197 in Annex I, Part C for the classifications.

Harmonized System: New edition 2022!

As of January 1, 2022, the 7th edition of the Harmonized System (HS 2022) comes into force. This edition involves many changes.

What and for whom is the Harmonized System?

The International Convention on the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS Convention) entered into force in 1988 with three objectives:

• to facilitate international cross-border trade and the collection, comparison, and analysis of statistics by harmonizing the description, classification, and coding of goods in international trade;
• to reduce the expenses related to international trade; and
• to facilitate the standardization of trade documentation and the transmission of data.

The Harmonized System has been used by more than 200 countries worldwide as a basis for their national customs tariffs. In addition, the HS is used in order to collect international trade statistics, trade negotiations and rules of origin and to monitor controlled goods.

Changes in the Harmonized system

Every 5 years, the HS is being revised. The new version of the Harmonized System Nomenclature can be found on WCO’s database platform. The new HS 2022 edition introduces some major changes with a total of 351 sets of amendments covering a wide range of goods. HS 2022 recognizes new product streams and addresses environmental and social issues of global concern.

On October 29, 2021, the EU Commission published the 2022 version of the Combined Nomenclature. Some of the key changes are:

• The HS 2022 amendments in Chapter 24 addressing novel tobacco products are transposed in the CN with specific headings and subheadings to allow for their identification and classification.
• Amendments in order to implement the gradual reduction of duty rates for products covered by the agreement on IT products, in the form of the Declaration on the Expansion of Trade in Information Technology Products.
• Introduction of new subheadings, including:
  • ‘not deterpenated rose oil’ (Chapter 33)
  • ‘fibre board and plywood’ (Chapter 44)
  • certain ‘steel tubes’ in (Chapter 73)
  • aluminium composite panels’ in (Chapter 76)
• Amendments to the classification of some substances in the list of non-proprietary names of pharmaceutical substances in the Annexes.

How to prepare for the changes in HS for 2022?

Before any review of the HS 2022 changes can be made, operators are encouraged to review the current tariff classifications of their products to ensure they are correct. This will help you accurately map your products to any changes.

The WCO has published 2017 to 2022 and 2022 to 2017 correlation tables that can be used to check if the current HS code will change and, if so, where the relevant goods will be classified.

Would you like to be sure that your HS codes are correct and according to the new changes? Pincvision can help support you on this! Contact us, so we can discuss what we have to offer. Fill in the form below and we will get in touch with you soon.