Herbal smoking products and Tobacco Products Duty

This guide explains your responsibilities if you are a UK manufacturer or importer of herbal smoking products, including: how to register as a manufacturer, the records you must keep, what returns you need to complete and where to get more help and advice.

The following products are classed as herbal smoking products. Herbal:

These are only examples of the type of products that are classed as herbal smoking products and other products could be affected.

UK manufacturers or importers: responsibilities

The rules for herbal smoking products apply to UK manufacturers and importers of herbal smoking products, and they also apply indirectly to wholesalers and retailers.

Manufacturers and importers will need to understand the legislation and put in place processes to calculate and record any duty they are liable for.

Wholesalers and retailers of herbal smoking products must ensure that they supply legitimate, duty-paid, product. If they do not, they can both be liable for the duty (‘jointly and severally liable’), and may face penalties for handling goods depending on the amount of unpaid duty.

If you’re a UK manufacturer of herbal smoking products you must:

If you’re a UK importer of herbal smoking products you must consign any herbal smoking products that you import into the UK under duty-suspension arrangements from an EU member state to an excise warehouse, a Registered Consignee or a Temporary Registered Consignee (these approval types apply only to Northern Ireland)

And if you are both a UK manufacturer and an importer, you must: