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As of 1 January this year, pleasure craft travelling from the European Union (including Ireland) to Northern Ireland are subject to new customs reporting requirements.

Pleasure craft are defined as craft used for the sport or pleasure of the owner. Pleasure craft can also be used by the immediate family or friends of the owner on a voyage for which the owner does not receive money.

If you carry any goods for industrial or commercial purposes, your vessel becomes a commercial vessel and is no longer a pleasure craft.

Pleasure craft are currently required to submit reports for journeys between NI and countries outside the EU. This is known as ‘outward clearance’ and ‘inward reporting’ and it allows the UK Government to risk assess journeys and identify potential customs and immigration violations.

Due to the UK’s exit from the EU, inward reporting will now also be required for pleasure craft travelling from the EU to NI. A minor exception exists from pleasure craft travelling from Ireland to NI as passenger reports will not be required.

Reports can be submitted electronically as per the e-c1331 Excel form as detailed within Notice 8; at the bottom of the form select the option ‘North (Region)’ which ensures that in addition to the form going to the national yacht line team, it also goes to Border Force agents in NI.

The official notice from HM Revenue & Customs is attached below.

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About Brittany Ferries

In 1967 a farmer from Finistère in Brittany, Alexis Gourvennec, succeeded in bringing together a variety of organisations from the region to embark on an ambitious project: the aim was to open up the region, to improve its infrastructure and to enrich its people by turning to traditional partners such as Ireland and the UK. In 1972 BAI (Brittany-England-Ireland) was born.

The first cross-Channel link was inaugurated in January 1973, when a converted Israeli tank-carrier called Kerisnel left the port of Roscoff for Plymouth carrying trucks loaded with Breton vegetables such as cauliflowers and artichokes. The story, therefore, begins on 2 January 1973, 24 hours after Great Britain's entry into the Common Market (EEC).

From these humble beginnings however, Brittany Ferries as the company was re-named quickly opened up to passenger transport, then became a tour operator.

Today, Brittany Ferries has established itself as the national leader in French maritime transport: an atypical leader, under private ownership, still owned by a Breton agricultural cooperative.

Eighty five percent of the company’s passengers are British.

Key Brittany Ferries figures:

  • Turnover: €202.4 million (compared with €469m in 2019)
  • Investment in three new ships, Galicia plus two new vessels powered by cleaner LNG (liquefied natural gas) arriving in 2022 and 2023
  • Employment: 2,474 seafarers and shore staff (average high/low season)
  • Passengers: 752,102 in 2020 (compared with 2,498,354 in 2019)
  • Freight: 160,377 in 2020 (compared with 201,554 in 2019)
  • Twelve ships operating services that connect France, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain (non-Covid year) across 14 routes
  • Twelve ports in total: Bilbao, Santander, Portsmouth, Poole, Plymouth, Cork, Rosslare, Caen, Cherbourg, Le Havre, Saint-Malo, Roscoff
  • Tourism in Europe: 231,000 unique visitors, staying 2.6 million bed-nights in France in 2020 (compared with 857,000 unique visitors, staying 8,7 million bed-nights in 2019).