On 10 March 2025, a draft amendment to the Decree of the Minister of Finance of 25 April 2022 on goods whose transport is covered by the monitoring system for the carriage of goods by road and rail and trade in heating fuels (Journal of Laws of 2024, item 1157), issued pursuant to Article 3 sec. 11 of the Polish Act of 9 March 2017 on the monitoring system for the carriage of goods by road and rail and trade in heating fuels, was published on the website of the Government Legislation Centre (RCL) (Journal of Laws of 2024, item 1218).
1. What changes does the draft introduce?
As part of the amendment, point 10 is to be added to § 1 of the amended Decree, according to which the SENT monitoring system will cover new groups of goods, namely:
- Chapters 61 and 62 of the CN — articles of clothing and clothing accessories,
- CN heading 6309 – second-hand clothing and other second-hand articles,
- Chapter 64 of the CN, footwear, gaiters and the like; parts of those articles.
According to the draft, the SENT system is to cover the transport of the above-mentioned goods purchased as part of the intra-Community acquisition of goods and imported from third countries.
2. When is the transport of clothing and footwear not subject to SENT?
§ 2 of the amended regulation will have an added paragraph 10, which provides that the carriage of goods from Chapters 61, 62 and 64 of the CN and CN heading 6309 commencing in the territory of Poland will generally not be subject to the obligation to report in SENT, except in two cases:
- Goods originating in a third country which, after being released for free circulation in the EU, are to be delivered inside or outside the EU (customs procedure 40 00 or 42 00).
- Failure to attach a paper invoice documenting sales, ICS or export – within the meaning of the VAT Act.
To sum up, the transport of clothing and footwear commencing in Poland will in principle be excluded from SENT, unless it meets one of the above conditions.
3. Effective Date
The obligation to monitor the transport of clothing and footwear in the SENT system will enter into force 3 months after the date of publication of the regulation in the Journal of Laws. Until then, entrepreneurs need to adapt their processes and systems.
4. Who is affected?
The inclusion of the textile industry in the SENT system will significantly increase the number of entities covered by the Act, including:
- Companies trading in new and used clothing (including wholesalers and online stores),
- Importers of clothing and footwear from outside the EU,
- Logistics and transport companies handling the above-mentioned transport.
5. Penalties for breach of SENT obligations
Failure to comply with transport monitoring obligations may result in severe fines, m.in.:
- 46% of the gross value of the undeclared goods, minimum PLN 20,000 – for the sender, recipient or carrier.
- PLN 20,000 – for the lack of confirmation of receipt or delivery of goods.
- PLN 100,000 – for delivering the goods to a place other than indicated in the declaration.
6. End date of transport – key definition for SENT
Pursuant to Article 2(1) of the SENT Act, the date of completion of transport may mean three different events, depending on the nature of the transport:
- Delivery of goods to a destination in Poland – applies to both domestic transport (e.g. Gdańsk-Łódź) and intra-Community or import transport ending in Poland.
- Placing goods under the customs procedure – transport from the EU or from Poland, ending at the national customs office (e.g. for export purposes).
- Export of goods from the territory of the country – applies to export outside the EU or transit through Poland.
