About the Suffolk Coastal Port Health Authority
Suffolk Coastal Port Health Authority serves business and the public by providing essential border checks on controlled imports:
- Import controls for animal origin food and products
- Ship sanitation control and certification
- Food standards, food safety and water quality
- Infectious disease control
Our team provide a professional, effective and efficient service with the quickest possible turnaround times for consignments of imported foods and products of animal origin.
We work with the Port of Felixstowe to maintain the efficiency of our service, and as far as possible we have integrated our own electronic system with the automated cargo handling system Destin8, TRACES, TRACES NT and IPAFFS.
History
Founded in 1899, Suffolk Coastal Port Health Authority is the largest Port Health Authority in the UK.
Its scale reflects the size of the Port of Felixstowe, which can accommodate the world’s largest vessels. As a result, much of the UK’s Far East trade passes through its docks, and a significant proportion of our import control work focuses on food and feed from that region.
Our team includes the Head of Environmental Services and Port Health, based in Woodbridge, supported by dedicated service managers, port health officers, official veterinarians, technical assistants, and import control assistants at our Felixstowe office. We also work closely with public analysts, consultants in communicable disease control, boarding medical officers, and the Health Protection Agency.
The Process
International Health
The Port Health Authority maintains controls at ports and aboard vessels carrying passengers and freight to protect the public and environmental health.
International health controls prevent the spread of infectious disease from vessels, seafarers and passengers into Britain.
Vessels are required to notify Port Health of any cases or symptoms of infectious disease aboard, before they arrive in port.
If symptoms are suspected, you should submit a maritime declaration of health form to port.health@scpha.gov.uk. Arrangements will then be made for a medical officer to visit the ship, assess any patients and initiate controls to stop disease being introduced into the UK.
East Suffolk Council’s pollution control team is responsible for pollution control measures within the port such as dust and dark smoke emission.
There are also public health hazard control which concern conditions aboard vessels for crew and passengers.
You must have a valid Ship Sanitation Certificate, (renewed every six months). Suffolk Coastal Port Health Authority carries out inspections and issues the required certification. There is a charge for the inspection.
All ships that travel internationally must be inspected to ensure that they are properly managed, free from pests and disease and that food is stored and prepared hygienically. Water supplies to ships and aboard vessels are also monitored.
In circumstances that pose an imminent risk to health, Port Health (with the Maritime and Coastguard Agency) will detain the ship until remedial measures have been taken.
Technology
We are committed to ensure that consignments are cleared as quickly as possible through the Port of Felixstowe. We work very closely with the port operator, importers, agents and other authorities to make the best use of technology which ensures every step is as efficient and effective as possible.
Our dedicated IT team maintains an in-house system, called PHILIS, which helps us carry out our statutory duty. PHILIS talks to other systems such as UK IPAFFS EU TRACES (Trade Control and Expert system), MCPs Destin8 system and CNS Compass to exchange as much information as possible electronically. The software is also used by many other Port Health authorities around the UK. We have also developed another system specifically for Animal Reception Centres and also provide a free online tool to enable the generation and submission of Plastic Declaration Documents (PDDs), Organics (COI) and Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing.
Improving information and transparency
We use mobile devices within the examination facilities. This enables us to record more of the key points during an inspection, and for the latest information to be available as soon as possible. Although customers are already notified when a consignment is requested for examination, in the future it will also be possible to add updates throughout the process. We are looking at how we provide this information to relevant organisations. We capture and save key information about consignments, checks (seals, IDs, Documents, Physical exams, sampling etc).
Border Trade Matching Service (BTMS)
Our systems at Port Health send updates to other authorities via a system called Border Trade Matching Service (BTMS). This helps the other authorities to speed up their release of consignments by electronically matching customs entries with the results of checks carried out by other inspection authorities. BTMS can:
- Match decisions from Procedure for Electronic Application for Certificates (PEACH) – horticultural/plant products;
- Match inspection decisions that are recorded on TRACES, TRACES NT, IPAFFS and finally;
- Transmit import control decisions to HMRC’s Customs Handling of Import & Export Freight (CHIEF) system.
This speeds up customs clearances across a range of imports including:
- Horticultural / plant products
- Live animals
- Products of Animal Origin (POAO)
- Food Not of Animal Origin (NAO) Regulation 2019/1793 ; Regulation 91/2013)
- Fishery products requiring Illegal, Unregulated and Unreported (IUU) catch certificates
You can find out more about BTMS on GOV.UK by reading the BTMS User Guide
If you need to request a manual clearance, use the BTMS Manual Release Form
Looking for more information on IT Support?
We provide IT support to several Port Health Authorities throughout the UK. Please visit our IT Support pages for more information.