UCC changes - purpose and impact

A cluster of EU customs changes has taken effect together, and they reach well beyond e-commerce. The €150 duty exemption is gone, and a flat €3 duty now applies to low-value goods. A new delegated regulation redefined 'postal consignment' to cover any goods under €150 sold in a distance sale, a reading that former Head of Irish Customs Anthony Buckley says could reach some business-to-business shipments. The declarant on low-value consignments is no longer the private buyer: liability moves toward e-commerce platforms, Import One-Stop Shop (IOSS) users and carriers. Alongside these, the CERTEX certificate-exchange deadline is now pressing, tied to the EU Customs Data Hub going live in 2028, and the Registered Exporter system (REX) becomes mandatory for preferential origin from 2027. Separately, a steel quota adjustment cuts duty-free quotas by 47% and raises out-of-quota duty to 50%. This session sets out what each change means in practice, and where the drafting is still unclear.