Labelbench
EN FR ع
  1. Home
  2. Shipping guides
  3. Shipping from the UK after Brexit

Shipping from the UK after Brexit

EU parcels need customs forms, and the CN22 was withdrawn in June 2026.

By Alex Carter Published

Two things changed for UK sellers in the last few years, and the second one is recent enough that a lot of advice online is now wrong.

Every EU parcel needs a customs declaration

Before 2021, posting from Manchester to Munich was paperwork-free. Both were inside the EU customs union, so the parcel was in free circulation.

That ended. The United Kingdom is now outside the union, which means a parcel to any of the 27 member states needs a customs declaration, exactly like a parcel to Japan or Brazil. There is no small-value exemption that removes the form: value affects duty, not whether you declare.

The practical consequences:

  • The recipient may owe import VAT and duty. Under EU rules, VAT applies from the first euro. A customer who paid £30 and then gets a bill for £9 plus a handling fee will usually blame you, so it is worth saying so at checkout.
  • Deliveries take longer. Customs clearance adds days, sometimes more in December.
  • Northern Ireland is different from Great Britain. Rules for goods moving between GB and NI have their own arrangements and have changed more than once. Check the current position rather than assuming it matches either side.

Since June 2026, Royal Mail wants a CN23

This is the one that catches people, because most guides still describe the old split.

The traditional rule was value-based. Below roughly 300 SDR, a small CN22 that sits on the label. Above it, a full CN23 on its own sheet.

Royal Mail and Parcelforce withdrew the CN22 on 1 June 2026. Every postal shipment leaving the UK now takes a CN23, whatever it is worth. A £6 pair of earrings and a £600 camera lens use the same form.

If a tool or a template hands you a CN22 for a UK-origin parcel, it has not been updated. The form itself is not wrong in the abstract, it is simply not what your carrier accepts any more.

The CN23 asks for more than the CN22 did:

  • Each item listed separately, with quantity and net weight per line
  • HS tariff code per item
  • Country of origin per item
  • Gross weight and total value
  • Category, and a signature

That itemisation is not optional padding. A CN23 whose only line reads “goods” is the version that gets opened.

Writing a UK return address

Worth getting right, because a returned parcel has to find its way back to you.

  • The postcode goes on its own final line, in capitals, with a single space between the two halves: SW1A 2AA, never SW1A2AA.
  • The post town on the line above is also capitalised, and it is required.
  • Leave out commas and full stops. Royal Mail’s automated readers cope better without them.
  • Skip the county. The postcode already identifies the delivery point, and a county line can slow sorting rather than help it.
MS A HUGHES
14 CASTLE STREET
BRISTOL
BS1 3AG

For an outbound international parcel, add UNITED KINGDOM as the last line of the sender block if the carrier asks for it, and put the destination country in English capitals on the last line of the recipient block.

What still trips sellers up

Declaring a sale as a gift. The gift allowance exists and it is scrutinised precisely because it is abused. A parcel from a business, containing three identical items, declared as a gift, is not convincing. The usual outcome is a held parcel and duty owed anyway.

Forgetting that Switzerland and Norway were never in the union. They are not new customs destinations, they always were. If you handled them correctly before 2021, nothing changed there.

Assuming the Republic of Ireland is domestic. It is an EU member state and a separate customs territory from the UK. Dublin needs the same paperwork as Dortmund.

Using an old integrated label. Combined address-and-customs labels bought before the change may still print a CN22 block. Check what your label stock actually says.

What this site does

Labelbench detects a UK sender on a customs route and asks for a CN23 rather than a CN22, prints it on its own sheet, and itemises whatever you declare.

It does not buy postage. The CN23 you print here travels on the parcel; if your carrier also requires the same data submitted electronically when you buy the label, that filing is separate and the paper form does not replace it.

Shipping guides