AES / export declaration
The export declaration in the Automated Export System (AES) is the electronic customs declaration for goods leaving the EU customs territory. For excise goods an e-AD runs in parallel up to the office of exit.
What matters in practice
On an export from the tax warehouse two procedures run in parallel. The export declaration covers the customs side (Article 263 et seq. UCC), the e-AD the excise side. The goods may move under duty suspension to the place where they leave the EU excise territory (section 16 (1) AlkStG). The ARC links the two.
The sequence is fixed. The export is declared first and the goods are made available at the agreed place of presentation. Customs then confirms that the export declaration and the e-AD match, and only after that does the consignment travel to the office of exit. Place of presentation and office of exit therefore belong in the planning of the trip, not in the rework afterwards.
The excise movement is not discharged by departure but by the export report, which takes the place of the report of receipt (section 33 AlkStV). That report rests on the exit confirmation issued by the office of exit.
Legal basis
Article 263 et seq. Union Customs Code
Example
A brand owner exports 30 consignments of vodka a year to Switzerland, each with its own AES declaration and its own e-AD. A consignment is only discharged once the exit confirmation arrives.
What goes wrong
Three entries cause most of the work. A goods description taken from the merchandise management system tells customs nothing if brand and type are missing. The place of presentation is often copied from an older declaration and then does not fit the route. And net mass and gross mass diverge when the packaging was left out of the calculation.
If the link between the AES declaration and the e-AD is missing, the movement stays open. The goods have physically left, the evidence has not arrived, and alcohol duty can arise.
At TXWH
TXWH files exports in AES and links them to the e-AD. Place of presentation, masses and goods description come from the product master data rather than from the delivery note.