July 2021 Update

June was another very hectic month here at Shiptheory. To begin with, we worked hard to ensure that our platform is 100% ready for the launch of the Import One Stop Shop. But we didn’t stop there: our dev team implemented support for the new CN22 customs forms and plenty of new features and updates. Keep reading to find out more.

The IOSS has arrived!

Big news for retailers shipping to the EU! After several months of preparations, the Import One Stop Shop has launched.

The complexity of VAT obligations across the EU member states makes it costly, time-consuming, and overly complicated for non-EU online retailers to comply with the different VAT duties expected of them when shipping their products to the EU.

Fortunately, that is about to change. From 1 July 2021, VAT charged at the point-of-sale for products up to EUR 150 shipping to the EU can be declared and paid via a single submission, the Import One Stop Shop (IOSS).

Here at Shiptheory, we are following closely any updates regarding the new EU VAT submission, and during the last months, we were working hard to have everything in place for our platform to support IOSS.

Several carriers already support IOSS but not all of them yet. For a detailed list of carriers that support IOSS so far, please read here.

As a result, if you add your IOSS number to your account, Shiptheory will automatically pass it directly to these carriers on your behalf. As simple as that.

And we provide several ways for you to do that. For more information on how to add your IOSS number to your Shiptheory account, please read this guide.

As more carriers update their APIs to accept IOSS numbers, we will update our integrations accordingly.

Support of the new CN22 customs forms

The CN22 is a customs form used when shipping goods internationally worth less than £270 with Royal Mail.

Royal Mail has now introduced two new forms, CN22A and CN22B, to replace the old CN22 forms. The new forms contain more information, and they are bigger in length than the old forms.

If you are printing CN22 customs forms from Shiptheory, we strongly recommend using the latest version. That will significantly reduce the chance of your international shipments being delayed, returned, or paying more tax.

You can enable the new CN22A and CN22B customs forms on your Shiptheory account in just a few clicks. Simply follow the steps in this guide.

Other additions of note that we implemented in the last month:

Expanded shipment tax number support

You can now add to your Shiptheory account various international tax numbers like EORI, IOSS, ATO, ABN, IRD, OSS, and VOEC.

Royal Mail: New services

Shiptheory now supports the following Royal Mail services:

International Business Parcel Bespoke Postal

International Business Printed Paper Bespoke Postal

International Business Parcels Tracked Signed DDP

International Business Parcels Tracked DDP

International Business Parcels Untracked DDP

Unleashed: Product weight override

You can now choose for Shiptheory not to download product weights from Unleashed and instead use the product weights located in your product catalogue within Shiptheory.

Tuffnells: Tracking information through the API

We now fully support tracking via Tuffnells. We could not do that up until recently due to a limitation of the Tuffnells’ API. But that has since been updated, and now you can get tracking numbers back when booking in via Tuffnells.

BluePark: Product variant names

Shiptheory can now pull product variant names from your BluePark account to be used on integrated labels.

DHL: Choose who pays customs duties in shipping rules

Until recently, you could only set who pays customs duties from the advanced settings on your account’s DHL integration page, meaning every shipment sent via DHL would charge either the recipient or the sender for customs duties. Now you can also select who pays at the point you are choosing a DHL service when creating a new shipping rule. As a result, you can control who pays customs duties on a per order basis.

If you have any queries regarding the above new features and updates, please do not hesitate to reach out to support. We are more than happy to give you a hand to get these up-and-running.

Otherwise, create a free Shiptheory account and start shipping smarter and faster today!