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The EMCS EMCS Data Interchange is the Vision Bond interface with HMRCfor HMRC's Excise Movement and Control Movement Control System (EMCS).

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What is on this page

Table of Contents
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What is EMCS

EMCS is an EU-wide computer system that’s used to record duty suspended movements of excise goods taking place within the EU.

How does this interact with Vision Warehousing

The EMCS discharge and the request for a new ARC are seamlessly built into the existing processing with Vision Warehousing.

VW Goods Inwards

With the pre-advice header and then EMCS tab you are able to select the ARC for the inbound goods and then discharge the goods, should you need to modify the receipt then you can perform this directly from the VW goods inwards screen.

Further information can be found at

VW Goods Outwards

Withdrawals from the warehouse which require the generation of an ARC for the goods are performed automatically at the point of confirm picking or despatch, at this point the final registration number of the vehicle needs to be entered.

The system will then obtain an ARC reference and automatically add it to the delivery note, the delivery note will not print without the ARC unless it has been force printed.

EMCS Menu

This menu is designed to provide you with an overview of all open and outstanding ARC’s which are on the EMCS system, during normal operations and where there are no issues this area does not need to be used however when there are issues you will need to enter here to resolve them.

The buttons are Split into three main sections. Post Brexit, this system continues to be used in the UK for duty suspended movements within the UK, and for movements between Northern Ireland and the EU. Each movement is assigned an Administrative Reference Code (ARC) which is a unique number to track the movement, this is printed on Warehousing’s delivery note to accompany the goods being moved.

Vision Bond is fully integrated with EMCS for movements of alcohol & tobacco, it is not used for the movement of energy products however.

Note

After having integrated Vision with your HMRC account, the HMRC website should no longer be used and all interactions should be via the Vision software only. Failure to do so can result in Vision Bond becoming out of sync with HMRC, the consequences of this will invalidate data output by the system in reports such as the W1.

Interaction with Vision Warehousing & Distribution

The main controls are found in Bond but this pushes and pulls data to / from Vision Warehousing & Distribution.

VW Goods Outwards

For goods leaving the warehouse, an order is entered on to the system requesting all required information. The only piece of information which is not required at order entry is the registration of the vehicle moving the goods. The order is picked and pick confirmed, if the user’s never entered a Vehicle Registration at order entry then this is done in https://visionsoftware.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VW/pages/2331869203/Despatch#Customs-Info-tab and then the record is sent to Bond’s EMCS module and an ARC is requested from HMRC.

After the ARC is requested HMRC usually return it within a matter of minutes, at this point it’s recorded in Bond, Warehousing & Distribution so that it can be printed on the Order’s Delivery Note. If using Depot Printing (the automatic printing of Manifests & Delivery Notes), the delivery note is printed automatically when the ARC is returned.

VW Goods Inwards

For goods coming into the warehouse, the originating warehouse request the ARC and HMRC forward this to the consignee / receiving warehouse. This ARC can be found on the paperwork accompanying the goods and users can attach it to a Pre Advice in Warehouse Receipts (while handling the received stock) or directly in the Pre Advice screen. The goods are typically received first and the Receipt Detail entry performed. During Bond Detail Receipt Warehousing calculates any differences between the quantities originally reported to HMRC by the consignor and the quantities actually received by the consignee. This helps the user to decide the ‘Global Conclusion of Receipt’ before finally confirming the receipt, which generates a ‘Report of Receipt’ record in Bond’s EMCS module which is automatically submitted to HMRC to discharge the movement.

Further information can be found at:

https://visionsoftware.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VW/pages/2608037895/GI+-+Receipting+Header#EMCS-References

GI - EMCS


System Components

EMCS Data Interchange screen

This is the screen available to Vision Bond users to handle all of their EMCS data.

Background job service

A job service which runs in the background on one of your servers is responsible for handling all of the communication with HMRC’s system, this works on a timer. Every couple of minutes or so this service checks for anything to submit to HMRC, and also checks if HMRC have any new messages for you and processes them automatically.

EMCS Data Interchange

Menu Options

Each of the buttons in the sections provides access to a form where you can find out more information.

For information on each of the buttons, the screens and the multitude of tabs related to the EMCS Data Interchange see the links in the tree view to the left of this page.

  • If you do not see the treeview it is likely that it has become minimized.

  • Click and drag this page right from its left-hand edge and the treeview of links should reappear.

Expand
titleGoods Arriving and Goods Leaving

e-AAD (Arriving and Leaving)

Use this screen to Search and Edit e-AAD Submissions and Responses to and from HMRC.

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Info

The same form is used to display both inbound and outbound ARC’s, the menu option takes you to the same form however the system filters for inbound or outbound.

Scroll right to see more columns including the Duty Liability column. This field shows the duty value of the submission which is the amount that would have to be paid by the Transport Guarantor should the goods be lost in transit.

You will see this tab when you click the e-AADs button and click search (providing it finds some e-AADs to display).

There are also tabs within this tab

These tabs (Requires Attention, Awaiting Submission, and All) are methods to quickly filter the results you see.

For the most part, the fields and layout remain the same for each tab but there are a few fields that exist on one tab and not the others and by default, some of the buttons will become enabled or disabled (greyed out) depending on which tab is clicked.

To keep the wiki simple as we can, we will list all fields regardless of which tab they show on and all buttons regardless of whether they are greyed out or not.

Buttons to the Right of the Screen

  • Click the Amend button to Edit the details of the currently selected submission in the results list and correct any issues in the data displayed in the details tabs at the bottom of the screen.

    • Once you have finished correcting any issues or making changes, click the Resubmit button (see below) to send the e-AAD to HMRC.

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  • Click the Cancel button to cancel the currently selected submission in the results list.

  • Click the Change Destination button to change the Destination record against the currently selected submission in the results list.

    • Make sure that the e-AAD has been accepted before you try to change its destination or HMRC will reject the change request  

  • Click the Resubmit button to resubmit the currently selected submission in the results list to HMRC.

    • Normally this would be done after changes have been made to correct any issues.

    • If an e-AAD submission is showing as Rejected but there is no reason, it normally indicates that the submission did not reach HMRC's system.

      • You can test this by resubmitting the e-AAD without making changes using this button. 

  • Click the Fallback button if you need to enter Fallback mode (and submit details to HMRC via manual paperwork).

    • This will generate a .pdf document with details you can print.

    • Some of the information on the Document may need to be filled in by hand.

    • Once issues are resolved outstanding submissions will go through.

    • It is your responsibility to record any that you process through Fallback

      • The system does not keep this information.

  • Click the Alert/Reject button will show the Report Of Receipt Alert Or Rejection Submission screen.

    • Enter the correct details on this screen.

  • Click the Save button to record the changes you have made. 

  • Click the Close button to discard any changes you have made since the Save button was last clicked and close this screen. 

  • Click the Manually Discharge button to tell the system that this submission has been dealt with manually so it no longer shows as outstanding.

    • This would normally be if you have updated the submission directly on the HMRC Gateway for any reason.

e-AAD Submissions Information Tabs Section

These tabs show all the details for the currently selected submission in the Results List

To make changes to the values in any of these tabs you will need to click the Amend button once the correct submission is selected.

  • If the Amend button is disabled ( greyed out) then you cannot amend the details against the submission you have currently highlighted.

Click on any of the tabs in the top row will update the section below

  • The Header Tab shows another row of Tabs. All the other tabs show either a list or a single screen of fields.

If you need to make changes to the values in the fields on any of these tabs you must have clicked the Amend button 

Expand
titleReceipts

Receipts

Use this screen to process a Report of Receipt against any eAADs where your Company is the Consignee

Both goods coming into the Warehouse and goods leaving the Warehouse have "Return of Receipt" transactions recorded against them when the goods have been received and can be seen in this tab.

You can use the filters at the top of the screen and then click the Search button to filter the results by the values entered

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Colour Key

Different states are indicated by a different back ground highlight

HMRC

Login

To connect Vision Bond to your HMRC account and start communicating with EMCS, click Login and follow the prompts.

Info

Please create a Government Gateway user account dedicated for use by the software, rather than sharing the same account as one of your actual users.


Goods Arriving & Goods Leaving

Items coming into the warehouse appear in the Goods Arriving section whilst those leaving the warehouse appear in Goods Leaving.

The screen design is the same for both of these sections, as such they’re described here as one.

e-AADs

Info

e-AAD, e-AD or ARC?

These are related and distinct distinct elements.

  • e-AAD (Electronic Administrative Accompanying Document) and e-AD (Electronic Administrative Document) refer to the same thing, this is an electronic document prepared by the consignor before dispatching the excise goods and contains information about the consignment, including it’s origin, destination and contents.

  • ARC (Administrative Reference Code) is a unique identifier assigned to a validated e-AD generated by the EMCS system. This must travel with the goods during transport and is used for tracking the movement.

Tabs at the very top of the screen divide the data into records:

Tab name

Details

Requiring attention

Needs user attention (use the filters at the top to filter further).

i.e. eAAD Drafts which have failed submission or have been rejected, ARCs with a Change of Destination which has failed.

In the grid row, click the left side '+' button to see more information about why the submission has failed.

Awaiting submission

Records waiting for the background job service to pick them up and submit to HMRC (use the filters at the top to filter further).

These are usually processed within a couple of minutes and will then move from this tab to the one of the other two.

All records

Use the filters at the top to filter.

There are filter fields at the top for further filtering of the data, ‘Search’ will apply them and return data in the grid below showing all matching ARCs.

A tabbed section beneath shows the full details of the currently selected ARC from the grid. Buttons to the right side of the grid allow the user to perform various operations, usually relating to the currently selected ARC in the grid.

Export to CSV

Provides an easy way for all of the grid data to be exported to an Excel Comma Separated Values (CSV) file, this requires an additional license to use, enquire with the support team if this is something you wish to add to your system.


e-AADs (Goods Arriving)

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The above extract shows items which are

  • Waiting to be receipted

  • Report of Receipt has been accepted

  • Reminders received from HMRC to send a Report of Receipt for overdue items

Alert/Reject

Pressing the button will load a screen, fill in the form and save to queue the Alert or Rejection to be sent.

Expand
titleWhat is an Alert / Rejection and what is it's process?

Before the goods arrive, the consignee, or any person empowered to submit a report of receipt on behalf of the consignee, is entitled to send a message to notify the HMRC and the consignor that the e-AD does not match his order or that he/she didn't order the movement. This includes either an alert or an actual rejection of the e-AD.

In particular, he should do so each time that an irregularity is suspected, such as:

·      he is not awaiting the described goods at all (maybe an error of the consignor, but maybe suspicion of fraud as well); in that case, he definitely rejects the e-AD;

·      the e-AD does not exactly match with his order (wrong quantities, in particular in case of surplus, erroneous but close product code...). In this case however, he could await the delivery in order to check the consignment at arrival.

The consignee should issue such a message as soon as he observes the discrepancy.

If the e-AD is rejected, the consignor is expected to submit a change of destination (or a splitting if the products are energy products) or - if the goods have not yet left the place of dispatch - cancel the e-AD. A particular change of destination is change of destination for return of goods, i.e. the new destination is now the place of dispatch.

If the e-AD is not rejected, but an alert has been issued, the consignor is entitled to:

·      leave the movement continue its way (e.g. after verification, the reasons of the alert do not prevent the goods from being accepted by the consignee); or

·      submit a change of destination (e.g. after verification, the e-AD correctly describes the goods actually sent but this is not what is expected by the consignee), so that the destination changes as soon as possible before the goods arrive at former destination; or

·      submit a splitting, if authorised by the context;

·      cancel the e-AD provided that the goods did not leave the tax warehouse of dispatch.

That message does not replace the necessary prior discussion between consignor and consignee to agree on the right contents of the e-AD.

If the e-AD is rejected, at least one, possibly several reasons must be given. Applying Risk Assessment in such cases is highly recommended.

Submission of the ‘Alert or Rejection of an e-AD’ message is mandatory where one of the cases referred to in points (a) to (c) or (e) of Article 15(1) of Regulation (EU) No 389/2012 is detected, and shall be sent to the competent authority of the Member State of dispatch within one day of the moment when the competent authority becomes aware of the discrepancies (as defined in Article 13 of Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/323).

Manually Discharge

If for any reason an ARC has been discharged (Report of Receipt accepted) on HMRC’s system and is not reflected in Vision Bond, use this button to manually update the status and close it.


e-AADs (Goods Leaving)

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The above extract shows items which are

  • Goods sent and awaiting the receiver to confirm receipt (including those which have had a Change of Destination submitted)

  • Items which have had the Report of Receipt sent by the receiving warehouse

Amend & Resubmit (Failures & Rejections)

A record may be submitted to HMRC and either fail or be rejected, here we explain how to handle these cases.

1

Where

In the ‘Requires attention’ and ‘All’ tabs

2

Identified by

See the ‘Status’ column

3

“+” button

Click to see why the submission failed, error messages displayed are what is returned from HMRC, use this to work out what needs correcting

4

Amend button

Click to put the record into edit mode

5

Bottom tabs

Show full details for the selected record, edit the fields here

6

Resubmit button

Click to lock the record and resubmit it. It’ll move to the ‘Awaiting submission’ tab, and will be picked up the next time the background service checks for records to submit.

Cancel

Click to cancel an ARC which is awaiting submission, already submitted or accepted by HMRC. For those ARCs which have already been accepted, after clicking the button the background job service will attempt to cancel them will be made by changing the status as follows:

  1. Cancellation Submission Pending

  2. Cancellation Submitted

  3. Cancellation Accepted (or Cancellation Rejected / Cancellation Failed)

Change Destination

Opens a new screen allowing you to change the selected ARC’s destination to another.

Fallback

This feature is used when the HMRC system is unavailable or you have a problem submitting the Draft ARC to HMRC. When used the following PDF’s are emailed:

Name

Details

Sent to

Fallback Accompanying Document (FAD)

To accompany the moving goods, some information may need to be filled in by hand:

View file
name470281_FallBackFAD_20240626112004.pdf

The logged in user’s email address.

Notification of Movement starting in Fallback

Sends basic information about the movement to HMRC:

View file
name470281_FallBackNoMF_20240626112004.pdf

HMRC

Setting - EMCSFallBackNoMEmailToAddress

At this point the status of the record will change to ‘eAAD Draft in fall back’, you can use the ‘Status’ filter in the ‘All’ tab to see all records currently in fallback. Note: it’s a good idea to keep a record of any movements started in fallback to ensure they all properly submit later. At the same time Vision Warehousing & Distribution will have their ARC temporarily set to the word ‘FALLBACK’, this ensures that it’s clear on delivery notes that the movement also requires the FAD.

For any records that Fallback has been used for, the background job service will keep trying to submit the record to HMRC so when the system is available again it should be submitted automatically.

Manually Discharge

See https://visionsoftware.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VB/pages/11730977/EMCS+Data+Interchange#Manually-Discharge.

Manual ARC Update

If for any reason an ARC gets stuck at status ‘eAAD Draft Submitted’ but HMRC have assigned an ARC to the movement, this button can be used to update the ARC in the system. This will update Vision Warehousing & Distribution in the same way that the automated process does.


Receipts

Info

Displays Report of Receipt (RoR) records lodged by the consignee of the movement.

Goods Arriving: Receipts - Shows RoR’s generated by your company

Goods Leaving: Receipts - Shows RoR’s received, generated by consignees of your outbound movements

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Similar to https://visionsoftware.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VB/pages/11730977/EMCS+Data+Interchange#e-AADs this screen has filters at the top to search for the data you’re looking for, with a grid beneath. The grid rows can be expanded with the “+” button to show errors received from HMRC, alternatively click a grid row to display it’s full Report of Receipt information in the tabbed section below.

Note

Unlike the e-AADs screen, this screen does not have a ‘Requires attention’ section. Users are reminded to monitor Report of Receipts at status Rejected and Submission Failed in order to Amend and Resubmit if required.

Colour Key

For each row different states are indicated by different background colours:

Green: Report of Receipt Accepted (

either the consignee or consignor's Report of Receipt has been accepted by the member state

the movement is considered discharged)

Red: Report of Receipt Failed (

your Report of Receipt has failed and required

user attention

to correct

required, amend it and resubmit)

Report of Receipt Submitted (your Report of Receipt has been submitted and is awaiting acceptance by HMRC)

Violet: Report of Receipt Submission Pending (

your Report of Receipt has

has not been submitted yet,

 Vision will

 the background job service should submit it shortly)

Pale Blue:

This is the currently selected Submission (this highlight will dominate any of the other colours above on the currently selected Submission.)
Info

Use the Amend button to allow editing of the fields according to the Submission Failure Reason details here and then Resubmit to HMRC.

ExpandtitleShortage Reasons (previously 'Explanations')

the currently selected row

Amend & Resubmit (Failures & Rejections)

A Report of Receipt may be submitted to HMRC and either fail or be rejected, here we explain how to handle these cases.

1

Where

In Goods Leaving > Receipts

2

Identified by

Set the Status filter at the top of the screen to:

  • Report of Receipt Rejected

  • Report of Receipt Submission Failed

…and click 'Search

3

“+” button

Click to see why the submission failed, error messages displayed are what is returned from HMRC, use this to work out what needs correcting

4

Amend button

Click to put the record into edit mode

5

Bottom tabs

Show full details for the selected Report of Receipt, edit the fields here

6

Resubmit button

Click to lock the Report of Receipt and resubmit it. It’ll change to status ‘Report of Receipt Submission Pending’ and will be picked up the next time the background service checks for records to submit.

Create

This button allows you to create a Report of Receipt manually in Vision Bond for submission to HMRC. Usually this is not necessary as most Reports of Receipt will be automatically imported from Vision Warehousing Pre-Advices (see GI - Receipting Header GI - Receipting Details GI - EMCS).

Shortage Reason

Click a Report of Receipt which contains a shortage or excess to enable this button. A screen is loaded which allows you to generate an ‘Explanation for Reason for Shortage’.

This can be created and sent by either the consignor or the consignee to provide a more detailed explanation for any discrepancies identified between the quantities in a delivered consignment and those described in the electronic Administrative Document (eAD). Despite its name, this message can be used to explain both shortages and excesses in the consignment.

Key points about submitting this:

  1. It can be submitted by both consignors and consignees.

  2. There are no restrictions on the number of messages that can be sent for any consignment.

  3. The message can include a generic description about the whole consignment or details by individual product.

  4. The information provided in this message is confidential and only visible to HMRC and the creator of the message.

This functionality allows both parties involved in the movement to provide explanations for any discrepancies, ensuring transparency and facilitating the resolution of any issues related to shortages or excesses in excise goods movements.

Export to CSV

See https://visionsoftware.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/VB/pages/11730977/EMCS+Data+Interchange#Export-to-CSV.


Reminders

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Shortage Reasons

This tab allows the user to provide reasons for shortages to HMRC as the Consignor or Consignee. The reasons can be entered and later the message submitted to HMRC

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ExpandtitleEvent Reports

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OTHERS

Event Reports

Event Reports are received from HMRC and relate to Events that the Consignor or Consignee needs to be aware of.
(There could be many types of these, for example a fire onboard a ship which the member state reports to HMRC would show as an Event).

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You will not be able to edit the Event Reports or submit them.

Expandtitle


Pre-

ValidatePre-

Validation

Use this tab to check whether the specified Excise Product Codes can be used on an e-AAD or Receipt to a specific Trader ID.  It will perform a live lookup on HMRC's system and return the results.

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This does not negate the need to run SEED checks to validate the full Postal Address.

expand

titleFailures



Failures

The Failures tab will show messages received

from HMRC which

from HMRC that the Vision System could not process.

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Processing Based On Arrival Dates Section (first Re-Process Message button)

If you need to, you can Re-Submit from this tab using the Re-Process button.

This uses all Report of Receipt records to find any ARCs that are missing in the system.

  • Then it reprocesses all messages for these ARCs from HMRC.

  • This may take a long time if there are many missing ARCs. 

Info

Use this function only when asked to do so

Processing Based On ARC Section (2nd Re-Process Message button)

  • This will Re-process all messages for the mentioned ARC from HMRC.

  • It may take some time to process the data.

  • Use this if you can see the ARC on the HMRC Gateway or in Bond, but the ARC is not showing against the Order in Vision Warehousing.

  • This can sometimes happen if HMRC has issues with their system (like delays in response).

Info

Use this function only when asked to do so