Diary of a Shopkeeper, 14th March

In last week’s diary I mentioned some of the extra costs and paperwork involved in importing goods into the UK since Brexit.  I didn’t expect to be returning to such a boring subject so soon, but this week my head has been reeling with moving goods in the other direction.

To be specific, I’ve been looking at sending cheese to France.  There’s a worldwide system of coding, used to indicate which tariffs are applicable to which goods, and so how much either the sender or the recipient pays.  It’s organised by the Word Customs Organization, and is called the Harmonised System, HS for short.

 At first I thought it was easy: 040610 is the code for cheese.  Except it’s not, it’s only the code for unripened and uncured cheese, and I have a nice cured and aged hard cheese to send.  Hmm, let me look down the list…

Could it count as a Processed Cheese?  Only if, ‘no cheeses other than Emmentaler, Gruyère and Appenzell have been used and which may contain, as an addition, Glarus herb cheese (known as Schabziger).’  I think…well…let me think.  No!  That’s no use.

How about if I classify it under ‘Other’?  In that case, it has to be, ‘Of a fat content, by weight, not exceeding 36% and of a fat content, by weight, in the dry matter not exceeding OR exceeding 48%.’

 Argh!  All I want to do is send some Westray Wife to an Orkney-cheese lover in Burgundy!  ‘What the heck does fat content in the dry matter even mean?’ I cried out in exasperation.  ‘This is impossible…it’s like a three-dimensional sudoku!’

Suddenly the shop door flew open with a bang.  ‘You talking to me?’ said the masked man in the doorway.

‘Eh, I was talking to myself really but who are you?’

‘Detective Chief Donnie Sudoku, Police West Mainland, cold case reviews a speciality.  And as you have a cheese mystery to solve, that’s well within my refrigerated remit.’

 ‘I was going to phone HMRC, but if you’re volunteering…’

‘In exchange for a cup of coffee I’ll do anything,’ he said.  ‘Well, not absolutely anything.  It would have to be legal, for a start.  Or at least a grey area, maybe the colour of a weak Nescafé with too much milk.’

I went to the corner and filled up the kettle.  The click of the switch seemed to spur him into action.  He whipped out a little black notebook.  ‘Right,’ he said.  ‘Let’s get you fitted up.  I mean sorted out.’ 

‘It’s like a maze,’ I said.  ‘All I want is the correct HS code and I keep being led in all kinds of confusing directions.  Just a minute ago I ended up reading about the code for the Offal and Minced Meat of Farmed Rhinoceroses, Elephants and Even-Toed Ungulates.’

‘Elementary,’ Sudoku snapped, ‘It’s 8269.’

‘Four digits?’ I said.  ‘I thought I needed at least six?’

‘The four-digit number is for the EHC,’ he said.  ‘Please tell me you have an EHC.  You can’t even start with the HS till you have the EHC.’

‘What’s an…?’

‘Export Health Certificate.  To get that you’ll need a Government Gateway account and a DEFRA account.  Don’t worry, I’ll get Sergeant Assistant Roxy to help you with the paperwork.’

‘You guys are very good at all this admin.’

‘Guess that’s why they call it a police procedural,’ he said and plonked himself in front of my computer.

I poured him a nice strong Twatticano.

‘Milk?’ he said.

‘You want more?’

‘No, the cheese,’ he said, ‘Is it made of cows’ milk?’

I nodded.

‘Pasteurised or unpasteurised?’

‘Unpasteurised.’

‘Okay, raw milk.  From a Category A country I take it?’

‘Does Westray count as Category A?’

‘Westray is always A-plus in all respects,’ he said.  ‘Fat content?’

‘I know I’m a bit overweight but…’

‘No, the cheese!’

‘Oh, sorry.  About 40% I think.’

‘Okay, that should do it.  Let’s see what we get.’  He clicked decisively on the keyboard and we gazed at the screen while a new set of numbers and bullet points flickered across it.

‘Ah ha!’  Sudoku pointed at the screen.  ‘Here we go:  ‘There is a ban’,’ he read, ‘’on exporting caviar, caviar substitutes, truffles and goods containing truffles to Syria and North Korea.’’

‘For gods sake!’ I cried.

‘I know,’ said Sudoku.  ‘As if the people of those poor countries aren’t suffering enough already.  Any more coffee?’

I poured him a fresh cup.

‘This is a nightmare,’ he said.  ‘In fact it reminds me of my ex-wife.’

‘Don’t be nasty,’ I said.

‘Not personally,’ he said.  ‘It’s just…this job.  It was always coming between us.’

‘Because you couldn’t switch off?  You took the worries of your latest case home?’

‘No.  Because I was a cop and she was an international drug smuggler.  It made things difficult between us.’

‘I bet it did!’

‘But I tell you: international drug smuggling was an awful lot easier than sending a lump of legal cheese to France!’

I shook my head in despair.  ‘So what am I going to say to my customer in Burgundy?’

He took a long drink of coffee.  ‘Let them eat Comté,’ he said.

This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 18h March. Other diaries continue to appear weekly. I am posting them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.