Overall responsibility of customs matters in the UK, including Brexit mitigation, AEO process and processes and controls

UK practise leader with the Global Strategic Trade Team with over 15 years of experience at consutancy firms focussing on customs and international trade issues.Provide clients on a wide range of customs and international trade topics covering import, customs procedures and export compliance. Activities include traditional topics such as customs valuation, tariff classification and origin as well as customs processes reviews and optimazion, including automation of customs and international trade procedures and processes. Working closely together with other teams (e.g. supply chain, transfer pricing , international tax ,etc.), provide assistance to various companies to assess their supply chain and trade model with the aim to be customs and international trade compliant and to facilitate the most beneficial customs and international trade position. Within the Global Strategic Trade Team, a specific focus on global projects and assisting companies with cross border queries, emerging markets projects and international trade model design.

Provide clients on a wide range of customs and international trade topics covering import, customs procedures and export compliance. Activities include traditional topics such as customs valuation, tariff classification and origin as well as customs processes reviews and optimazion, including automation of customs and international trade procedures and processes.

Tax audits and appeal procedures:A part of the activities involve support to companies that are involved in tax audits or discussions with the tax authorities. This includes preparing the (tax) file for the tax audit, assisting the company in meetings with the tax authorities, drafting letters and also representation during appeal procedures with the tax authorities and in court. I have grown from the person actually performing these activities to introducing the Deloitte team members and managing the process. In this respect, progress of the project, commitment of the persons involved and quality assurance are my main responsibilities.Supply chain management:My projects included a supply chain restructuring whereby the production of the goods was shifted from various jurisdictions worldwide to one location in the Far East. This included a complete new business set-up and model of doing business worldwide using one central entrepreneur. Our team has assisted the indirect tax feasibility study as well coordination of defining all compliance obligations for 13 countries. This included VAT, customs duty calculation, customs and VAT optimization procedures, high level legal requirements and the draft set-up of a process manual to incorporate this in the international organization. My role was a combination of controlling the quality of the content as well as supervising the project and the coordination with the client.

After achieving a master degree in indirect tax & customs in 2001 I shifted to the indirect tax and customs practice of Deloitte. After the merger of Arthur Andersen with Deloitte (June 1, 2002) I have specialized in Customs & Global Trade. I have worked in the Rotterdam office until June 2007. In June 2007 I shifted to the Amsterdam office. The reason for this shift was, amongst others, that all Customs & Global Trade specialists working in the Amsterdam office had left Deloitte. Furthermore, the new indirect tax partner in the Amsterdam office provided me the possibility to focus more on the processes and business needs of companies. As a result of starting up a new group in the Amsterdam office, I worked very closely together with the indirect tax (VAT) specialists.

I joined Deloitte in 1998 in the general tax department. At that time I was still a student at the university and was looking for relevant working experience. I worked 3 to 4 days per week combining the work with my education. My work consisted of drafting personal income tax and corporate tax returns and communications with clients and tax authorities. In 2000 I got interested in Indirect taxes and international trade. As a result, I choose to apply for an additional master besides the direct tax master and graduated for both