VERSION FRANCAISE

Background

Within the European Union, the majority of your trade is carried out freely without customs clearance procedures and without inspections at borders. However, every month, you are obliged to send a reply to the statistical survey on intra-EU trade in goods (EMEBI) to the French customs departments tasked with producing foreign trade statistics. You must list all your dispatches and/or arrivals carried out with EU Member States if you have received a letter from the Directorate General of Customs and Excise (DGDDI) advising you of the requirement to reply to the survey.

• Reference note for the reply to the monthly statistical survey on intra-EU trade in goods (EMEBI - in French)

Why is the monthly statistical survey on intra-EU trade in goods conducted?

This mandatory monthly statistical survey provides a vital source of information for a range of economic agents and for tracking the nation’s economic activity, since the figures that it collects every month on dispatches and arrivals of goods are used domestically to produce France’s trade statistics.

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When are you obliged to reply to the statistical survey?

For Intra-European Union trade, we refer respectively to:

• Arrival: entry into France of EU goods from another Member State (conversely, goods arriving from a non-EU country are imports)
• Dispatch: departure of EU goods from France to another Member State (conversely, a shipment to a non-EU country is an export)

You are obliged to reply to the statistical survey EMEBI if you have received a letter at your company’s registered office (or establishment) advising you of the requirement to reply to the mandatory monthly statistical survey. The letter details the relevant flow (arrival, dispatch, or arrival and dispatch) as well as the period under review.

As for all statistical surveys, a list of companies covered by the survey is drawn up every year. This list is called a “sample”. Only companies which are part of the selected sample and which have received a letter beforehand advising them of the requirement to reply to the survey are obliged to reply to the EMEBI.

The statistical information provided is protected by Article 6 of Act no. 51-711 (amended) on legal obligation, coordination and confidentiality as concerns statistics which provides, in the third subsection of paragraph II that “This information may not under any circumstances be used for the purposes of tax audits or punitive measures”.

How is the reply to the statistical survey on intra-EU trade in goods transmitted online?

Companies must send their replies to the statistical survey by logging onto the secure data collection website using their username and password. If a company does not yet have a douane.gouv.fr account giving it access to online customs services, it can create one directly on the website. On the website, you can also consult or download the tables of the commodity codes to be mentioned in your reply.

What information has to be included in the reply to the statistical survey?

Identification data for each reply to the EMEBI

The reference period

This is, generally:

• for arrivals, the calendar month during which the VAT became payable in France
• for dispatches, the calendar month during which the VAT became payable in the other Member State in respect of the corresponding acquisition

There are exceptions to these rules (call-off and consignment stock transactions, sale after trial)

The flows

Select the type of flow (dispatch or arrival)

Company identification information

• your VAT identification number
• your corporate name
• your address
• and your contact details

Data describing the trade in goods

1. Commodity code

This is the eight-digit combined nomenclature (CN8) which is common to all Member States. In certain cases, a ninth digit is compulsory (general product classification, NGP).

The combined nomenclature can be found here.

2. Country of destination (dispatches)/country of consignment (arrivals)

You must fill in this section with two alphabetic characters. For dispatches, this is the code of the Member State of destination of the goods and, for arrivals, the code of the Member State of consignment.

It may only be a code referring to an EU Member State or Northern Ireland, excluding France (FR) as listed in the table below.

Member States	Code to use
Austria	AT
Belgium	BE
Bulgaria	BG
Cyprus	CY
Czech Republic	CZ
Germany	DE
Denmark	DK
Estonia	EE
Spain	ES
Finland	FI
Greece	GR
Croatia	HR
Hungary	HU
Ireland	IE
Italy	IT
Lithuania	LT
Luxembourg	LU
Latvia	LV
Malta	MT
Netherlands	NL
Poland	PL
Portugal	PT
Romania	RO
Sweden	SE
Slovenia	SI
Slovakia	SK
Northern Ireland	XI

Codes of EU Member States and Northern Ireland

3. Value

You must state, accordingly:

- in the event of use of procedure codes 11 and 21, the taxable amount of the goods, i.e.:

• the amount of intra-Community supplies/acquisitions of goods in accordance with provisions concerning VAT
• the amount of the purchasing price or cost price of the company’s goods in the event of the transfer of goods whose use is taxable in the Member State of destination

- in the event of use of procedure codes 19 and 29, the invoice value of the goods, or failing this, the amount which would have been invoiced in the event of any sale or purchase.

You must declare an amount in euros rounded to the nearest full unit.

4. Conditions for EMEBI procedure codes

You must use a two-digit numerical code, taken from the following list.

Procedure codes for dispatches

Procedure code	Type of dispatch
21	Exempt supply and transfer
29	Other dispatches: for processing under contract and following processing under contract, etc

Procedure codes for arrivals

Procedure code	Type of arrival
11	Intra-Community acquisition taxable in France
19	Other arrivals: in view to processing under contract following processing under contract VAT-exempt purchases, etc.

The procedure code is a two-digit code enabling the VAT tax nature of the movement of goods to be specified. It allows for the disassociation of intra-EU acquisition and supply movements followed by taxation, so-called “taxable” movements (procedure 11 for arrivals and procedure 21 for dispatches), from those which are not (procedure 19 for arrivals and procedure 29 for dispatches).

5. Net mass

You must state the mass in kilograms (without decimal places) of the goods without all their packaging.

 

9. The département  

You must state the French département (two-digit numerical code) of initial shipment of the goods for dispatches or actual destination for arrivals.

This information bears no direct relation to the location of the relevant company’s registered office. 

10. Country of origin

Since 1 January 2022, the country of origin must be stated for arrivals and dispatches.

The country of origin must be mentioned using two alphabetic characters.

It is the country where the goods originated within the meaning of customs regulations on origin (generally, the country where the goods were entirely obtained or where they underwent their last substantial processing or working).

This means that the code may correspond to a EU country, a non-EU country or to France (FR) for returns. For arrivals, it may differ from the country of consignment (see 2).   

11. Partner VAT ID number

The “partner VAT ID number” variable has been included for dispatches in the statistical survey for procedure codes 21 and 29.

In the EMEBI, this variable corresponds to the VAT ID number of the partner operator in the EU Member State where the goods are supplied. For statistical purposes, its definition is the same as that for tax purposes which appears in the VAT recapitulative statement.

You can consult the structure of VAT numbers for EU Member States in the instructions for the statistical survey.