The European Union's customs reform package entered into force on 22 September 2026. If you import into the EU, whether as bulk pallets into a warehouse or as individual parcels to customers, you are inside its scope. The detail of the package sits in the Commission's legislative text and should be read there before anyone signs off a change to your import process.

Entry into force is the date worth diarising, because it is the point at which the new framework becomes the law your shipments are handled under. Trade press moves faster than legislative text, so the responsible sequence is to note the date now and confirm the operative detail against the Commission's own publication before changing anything you rely on.

What should a brand do in the meantime? Not panic, and not rewrite a working process on the strength of a headline. The useful move is to know exactly what your current import position is, so that when the detail lands you can tell in an afternoon whether it touches you.

• Who is the importer on your EU shipments, and is that arrangement documented rather than assumed
• Which channels do your goods actually use to enter the EU, and does each one have an owner inside your business
• Where do your customs records live, and could you produce them for a specific shipment inside a working day

Brands that cannot answer those three questions quickly are the ones that lose time whenever a customs framework changes, because the first week goes on working out what their own setup is. Brands that can answer them treat a reform package as a review rather than a project.

There is also a structural point here that outlasts this particular package. A brand posting individual parcels into Europe meets the customs system on every order, which means every rule change lands on the whole order book at once. A brand importing in bulk to EU-held stock meets it on a scheduled shipment, with paperwork prepared in advance and a known owner. The second model absorbs regulatory change far better, which is why it tends to be the first thing we change for brands scaling in Europe.

Expandly sets up your EU import and tax position before stock moves, so a change to the customs framework is something your team reviews rather than something your shipments discover.