On 27 July, the UK’s HM Revenue and Customs issued a “Notice to Exporters” relating to two companies fined £216,530.30 and £20,889.15 respectively.
The companies were not named.
The conduct was not described in any detail and only said to “relate to unlicensed exports of military-listed goods and related activity prohibited by The Export Control Order 2008 and contrary to The Customs and Excise Management Act 1979”.
The details of why and how these companies were able to secure a resolution via a compound penalty were also not provided, although the Notice says in general terms:
“Compound settlements may be offered where an exporter has:
- voluntarily told HMRC about sanctions or export control breaches, and
- committed a breach that was inadvertent or due to weaknesses in internal controls”.