Origin Declaration Checker

Whether your goods actually have preferential origin depends on the rules of origin for that arrangement — the processing done, where the materials came from, and the value added. No amount of correct wording makes non-originating goods originate. This tool checks that the sentence on the invoice is the one the law prescribes.

Fix: For the origin determination itself, work from the rules of origin of the specific arrangement, or ask your customs authority.

Source: European Commission — Proof of origin (preferential rules of origin)

The wording of an origin declaration is fixed by law and reproduced word for word in the regulation. A sentence that means the same thing is not the same thing: customs in the importing country can refuse preferential treatment on the wording alone, and the duty then falls on your buyer.

Fix: Copy the prescribed text for the arrangement you are using and fill only the blanks.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

Every word outside the blanks is prescribed. Rewording, adding a clause or dropping one turns the declaration into something the regulation does not recognise, even where the meaning survives.

Fix: Restore the prescribed wording exactly; only the blanks are yours to fill. If you are declaring under a specific free trade agreement, note that those prescribe their own wording — the EU–UK agreement, for instance, uses an exporter reference number rather than a customs authorisation number — and this check does not cover them.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The regulation contains three declarations whose openings are nearly identical and whose endings are not. Text copied from one and continued from another is not a valid version of either — and it is the ending that tells customs which arrangement you are claiming under.

Fix: Decide which arrangement applies and use that declaration in full.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The dots in the prescribed text mark where your own details go. A declaration sent out with the dots still in it states nothing, and it is the most common failure when the text has been copied from a guidance page rather than typed.

Fix: Replace each placeholder with the actual value, or leave the space genuinely blank where the footnote allows it.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The blank before "preferential origin" is where the origin of the products goes. Without it the sentence declares that the goods are of no particular origin, which is not a claim customs can act on.

Fix: Enter the origin — for EU goods this is normally "European Union" or "EU".

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The number in brackets declares that you hold an approved exporter authorisation. The regulation reserves that space for approved exporters; anyone else must omit the words in brackets or leave the space blank. Quoting a number you do not hold — or one copied from another company’s invoice — is a false statement to customs.

Fix: Keep the number only if the authorisation is your own. Otherwise delete the bracketed words entirely.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

Without an approved exporter authorisation, an invoice declaration may only be made out for a consignment up to a value threshold. Where the preferential arrangement does not set its own figure, the regulation puts it at EUR 6 000 per consignment.

Fix: Above that value you need either an approved exporter authorisation or a movement certificate EUR.1.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

A statement on origin made out by a registered exporter must end by stating which origin criterion the goods meet. It is the part that says why the goods originate, and it has no equivalent in the other two declarations.

Fix: State the origin criterion met, as the REX statement on origin requires.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

A statement on origin identifies the exporter by their REX number. Without it the importing customs cannot look the exporter up in the public REX database, which is the check they are required to perform above the value threshold.

Fix: Enter your registered exporter number.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The general invoice declaration is prescribed in every official EU language. The two GSP forms are prescribed only in French, English and Spanish, because they are made out in beneficiary countries. A German or Italian version of a GSP declaration is not a prescribed version.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

Each language version is prescribed separately and is equally valid; the declaration does not have to be in English. What you must not do is translate the text yourself — use the version the regulation gives for that language.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The regulation is typeset with curly quotes and long dashes; a copy that came through a plain-text editor will have straight ones. Customs does not reject a declaration over the shape of an apostrophe, so those differences are normalised here rather than reported as deviations.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

The prescribed forms carry a place and date and the exporter’s signature beneath the declaration. The footnotes allow the place and date to be omitted where that information already appears on the document itself, and allow the signature to be waived in the cases the regulation sets out — where the signature is waived, the printed name of the signatory may be omitted too.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions

Only the declarations in the Union Customs Code implementing regulation are covered. Individual free trade agreements — the EU–UK agreement among them — prescribe their own wording in their own annexes, and a declaration made under one of those has to be checked against that agreement instead.

Source: Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/2447 — Union Customs Code implementing provisions