Bringing wine in from France on return from holiday

[Sazzzooo]

Just dreaming of holidays for the summer and think we will be doing a driving holiday in France and Germany. One of the the pleasures of French holidays for me has always been wine and having the ability to bring back loads at the end of the holiday.

I see that since Brexit has allowed us to 'take back control' we are restricted in the amount of wine we can bring in.

According to this www.gov.uk/bringing-goods-into-uk-personal-use/arriving-in-Great-Britain - we can bring in 19 litres of still wine and 9 litres of champagne.

How is this enforced? Do they check random cars at Eurotunnel ? If I was to accidentally bring in slightly more would I be hauled up in front of the customs people and fined or is there some leeway if it wasnt enormous amounts?

Any knowledge / experience?

No experience yet - ask me the 2nd week of August!

But could do with some clarity of personal allowance, is that per vehicle coming back into the country? Or per person. Cos you know the word person is actually in the word personal so you know full well it's going to be per vehicle...
And remember it's the UK border force who would check you at Calais, so yes I reckon letter of the law.

I think there are random checks. According to that link, if you go over the limit you will be charged for everything!

If you get stopped and found to be over your allowance you'll have to pay import tax on the excess. You're not going to be thrown into jail.

We are driving to France at Easter for holidays and to see family. I will update at the end of April. I guess it’s the same with du fromage as well which is annoying 🧀

If you get stopped and found to be over your allowance you'll have to pay import tax on the excess.
Not just the excess. You will be charged for the whole amount in that category.

Surely you'll know how much you bring back, so can't "accidentally" do anything. If you have more than the allowance, declare it at customs and pay the duty.

I'd imagine there will be random checks, just as there have always been except that now they'll be looking at booze quantities as well.

Eighteen litres is a fair amount of wine to bring back though. Do you really need more than that?

So if there are two adults in the car, can you get double that?

@AgathaX

I'd imagine there will be random checks, just as there have always been except that now they'll be looking at booze quantities as well.

Eighteen litres is a fair amount of wine to bring back though. Do you really need more than that?

Eighteen litres is only the same as a couple of cases of wine.

There will be random checks by customs and yes you do risk fines and paying for the goods.
I recently travelled to the UK from France and back by ferry and the wait after disembarking from the ferry was horrendous both sides of the channel. Thankyou Brexit.

Eighteen litres is a fair amount of wine to bring back though. Do you really need more than that?

Hardly, 24 bottles not even a bottle a week.

Random checks will be done and anything found over will be confiscated and you'll face fines. They may confiscate the whole lot I believe.

Tbf there are loads of rules about bringing stuff back into UK, especially tax free stuff (ie from cruise ships or Gibralta for example) but it's only ever booze and cigs I've seen them check.

Ah yes, another downside of Brexit (I've yet to find anyone who can tell me there are any upsides ). As I recall, we brought back the maximum limit of 24 bottles of still wine and 12 bottles of sparkling per adult last summer (some of this was for other people though!). We came back via the tunnel and noted that there wasn't anywhere at the terminal we could go to declare anything beyond this, or make a payment for it. Suspect that this will be put in place for this year though. Just a caution, if you have more than the allowance, you have to pay a charge on EVERY bottle you bring back, not just the bottles which exceed the allowance - it equates to about £3/bottle iirc.

We did France trip in October - two adults - so double amount. We stuck to limits re wine (and tobacco, beer, spirits and other gifts/groceries). We weren't stopped but some on ferry were and the "pull over" was random. We were glad we didn't chance it to be honest as it would have been an expensive and stressful end to holiday if we had. French relatives had (bless them) bought us a shit load of wine as present and we had to leave it there!

@Sazzzooo Yes random checks. You'll either have to pay the import duty on the excess on surrender it.

@Nootkah As PPs have said, it’s not duty on the excess, it’s on every bottle you bring in if you’re over the limit.

@TakeYourFinalPosition

Oh yes! Thanks for the clarification. Id obviously been affected by the xuatoms programmea I watxh where there are different rules.

@Sazzzooo I was wrong above, you absolutely do pay import on ALL that you bring (although Im not sure if there is an option to surrender the goods or not?)

@Takeyourfinalposition. Do you know if there's an option to aurrender the excess like there is in some countries?

You have to pay on everything if over - so if you are over the limit by just one litre you pay for all you have brought in. Same for tobacco, beer and goods/gifts