Meyer manufacturers over 40 million pieces of cookware annually from its factories in China, Thailand and Italy, the warehousing and distribution of which is managed from its headquarters in the North West of England. With such a large volume of import and export customs entries to manage on a daily basis, including a range of more complicated entries such as nylon kitchen tools, which require extra documentation and test reports, Descartes recognised the benefits Meyer would gain from being involved as an early adopter of CDS.
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) is migrating away from the legacy Customs Handling of Import and Export Freight (CHIEF) system to its new Customs Declaration Service (CDS).
“As a long-standing user of the Descartes eCustoms platform, we were pleased to be able to migrate from CHIEF to CDS with the unbridled support from Descartes,” comments Sean Priest, Operations Director, Meyer Group Ltd. “CDS is more complex than CHIEF and requires a lot more information in the background. This is where Descartes has been instrumental in ensuring a smooth transition. From helping to set up our templates to managing the liaison with HMRC, they were able to seamlessly iron out any teething problems that originated from the new system and with no impact on our business continuity. We’ve also been able to request changes and adaptations to CDS through our collaborative partnership with Descartes, which has been a great benefit.”
