AEO, General Requirements

• an appropriate record of compliance with customs requirements,
• a satisfactory system of managing commercial and, where appropriate, transport records, which allows appropriate customs controls,
• where appropriate, proven financial solvency, and
• where applicable, appropriate security and safety standards.  

Company information

Criteria: You should provide us with information on:

• the organisation of the company, owners, members of the board of directors, and legal status
• business activities and economic sector of activities
• internal structure
• knowledge of: customs declarations, customs procedures and your economic sector of activities. This is to ensure that issues like tariff classification, customs value, restrictions, and rules of origin are correctly dealt with.

The company shall make customs declarations of acceptable quality. This means that the declarations shall be lodged in time, the charges declared shall be correct, all conditions regarding restricted goods shall be fulfilled, and the statistics shall be correct.
 

Compliance

Criteria: The applicant company or the people in charge of the company should not have committed any serious infringement or repeated infringements of customs rules over the last three years preceding the application. If the applicant has been established for less than three years, we will judge the compliance on the basis of records and information that are available. The applicant´s compliance with the rules will be judged by us on the basis on our records.

The same applies if the people exercising control over the applicant company are established or resident in a third country. In this case we judge their compliance with the requirements on the basis of records and information that are available to us.
 
Accounting and logistical system
Purpose: To verify that your company has a satisfactory system of managing commercial and, where appropriate, transport records, which allow appropriate customs checks. 

Criteria: Your company shall maintain an accounting system which is consistent with the generally accepted accounting principles applied in the MemberState where the accounts are held and which will facilitate audit-based customs control. To enable us to apply the necessary checks, you have to allow Customs physical or electronic access to your customs and, where appropriate, transport records. Electronic access is not a pre-requisite to comply with this requirement.

Your company shall have a logistical system which distinguishes between Community and non-Community goods. It should also be possible to create an audit trail of any business transaction in your system. The first of these two criteria does not need to be fulfilled in the case of an AEO certificate — Security and Safety.
 
Financial solvency
Purpose: To verify that your company has a proven financial solvency.

Criteria: By financial solvency we mean a good financial standing which is sufficient to fulfil the commitments of your company, with due regard to the characteristics of the type of business activity.

If your company has been established for less than three years, we will judge your financial solvency on the basis of records and information that are available.
 
Security and safety
Purpose: Security assessment conducted by the applicant (self assessment).

Criteria: You should in your policy demonstrate a high-level awareness on security and safety measures, internally and in your business activities with clients, suppliers and external service providers. Before our certification audit, you should therefore prepare a description of the present situation, with the purpose of identifying the risks and threats which might occur in the part of the supply chain in which you are operating. You should also look into the measures you have taken to minimise these risks and threats.
 
Further information
Do you wish to become an AEO?