Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what reason he decided to develop a bespoke customs management software instead of using UNCTAD's ASYCUDA system.

HMRC are not developing a bespoke Customs Management software. They have selected a commercial package called Declaration Management System (DMS) as part of the CDS programme. DMS has been deployed into HMRC’s live environment and traders are already making transitions onto the new platform.

UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) offer the ASYCUDA system to developing countries as an alternative to DMS. There are about 90 countries with relatively small Customs functions (e.g. Albania, Palestine, and Somoa) using ASYCUDA worldwide. ASYCUDA is not used by any G7 or G20 countries.

ASYCUDA was considered alongside DMS as one of the options for CHIEF replacement. It was not selected as the preferred option because (a) it did not meet all of the Union Customs Code functional requirements and (b) there were no reference countries processing anything like (pre EU Exit) UK declaration volumes, and no guarantees that ASYCUDA could meet UK volumes. With an expected five-fold increase in declaration volumes resulting from our departure from the EU, ASYCUDA looked less well suited to UK requirements.