Vaping samples for testing duty-free only if fully destroyed, HMRC says

HMRC's guidance on who is impacted by Vaping Products Duty and the Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme contains a section on vaping products used for testing. The section draws a sharp line between destructive regulatory testing, which can move duty-free, and everything else, which cannot.

On who may test, a laboratory carrying out regulatory testing needs no specific HMRC approval for that activity, provided it is a genuine testing laboratory holding appropriate third-party accreditation — ISO/IEC or UKAS are given as examples — for the work undertakenGOV. Where a trader tests its own products, checks should confirm the facility is genuine. The same applies where the laboratory handles vaping products on which duty has not been paid and the products are destroyed as an essential part of the testing process. The trader should be able to produce copies of regulatory testing reports to an HMRC officer on request.

Where testing destroys the sample, vaping products for regulatory testing only may be supplied without payment of duty and without a duty stampGOV, as long as the process results in destruction of the entire sampleGOV — destruction immediately after testing is acceptable. There is no requirement to move products supplied in these circumstances under EMCS. The process counts as a destruction of the vaping product, and the trader should notify HMRC in line with section 14.8 of Excise Notice 197GOV, under which warehoused vaping products may be destroyed without payment of duty if the correct procedures, including advance notice, are followed.

Where testing destroys none or only some of the sample, the product must be duty paid and stampedGOV, and duty-suspended vaping products must never be used for that purposeGOV. The regulatory-testing rules do not extend to consumer testing at allGOV: testing involving consumption by a person — the guidance gives testing a new flavour with consumers as the example — must always be duty paid and carry a duty stampGOV, and duty-suspended product must never be used for itGOV.

For manufacturers, importers and warehousekeepers moving e-liquid samples for testing, duty-free supply is confined to samples destroyed in full with the Excise Notice 197 notification madeGOV; anything retained, partly consumed or put to consumers must be duty paid and stampedGOVGOV. Legal basis: Vaping Products Duty and the Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme, and section 14.8 of Excise Notice 197 on destructions.