Apply for Approval for Vaping Products Duty and Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme

Guidance

Apply for approval for Vaping Products Duty and the Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme

What you need to do to apply for approval for Vaping Products Duty and the Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme.

From: HM Revenue & Customs Published 1 April 2026 Last updated 28 April 2026
— Get emails about this page Print this page

Before you start

If you want to produce vaping products in the UK, you’ll need to apply for approval.

It is an offence to produce vaping products without the appropriate approval, or on premises that we have not approved. You may have to pay a penalty if you do. We can also confiscate any vaping products, packaging, equipment or substances used in the production of vaping products.

Who needs to apply

You should apply for HMRC approval if you want to do any of the following:

• manufacture vaping products in the UK
• store vaping products without payment of duty (under duty suspension)
• handle vaping duty stamps — for example, purchase or affix stamps as a UK manufacturer, warehousekeeper, or UK representative acting for overseas manufacturers Your approval must be for a single legal entity.

You must apply for approval as a single legal entity. This is when all parts of the business are controlled and managed by the same person or group of people jointly, and they’re treated as one business for legal and tax purposes.

If you submit a joint application, we’ll reject it.

When you need to apply

You should apply at least 45 working days in advance to make sure you have the necessary approval before 1 October 2026.

If you’re not approved by 1 October 2026 you cannot lawfully produce vaping products in the UK, and if you do, you will be subject to civil and criminal sanctions, potentially leading to prison sentences.

What you will need

When you apply for approval for Vaping Products Duty and the Vaping Duty Stamp Scheme, you must use a Government Gateway ID that is linked to a Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR) number for either:

• Self Assessment

• Corporation Tax
  You also need to provide information to us including the:

• business name and address

• VAT or Corporation Tax number (if you have one)

• name of a responsible person

• premises plan

• business plan

• financial guarantee from a financial institution (if we ask you to)

• the number of vaping duty stamps you need within a 3 month period for each capacity that you’re applying for the stamps

If you’re applying to manufacture vaping products in the UK

You’ll also need to provide:

• the date you intend to start manufacturing vaping products
• an estimate of how much vaping liquid (also known as e-liquid) you’ll produce within a 12 month period
• details of any vaping products you send to, or receive from, other approved businesses or excise warehouses, including the approval numbers assigned to that approved person or excise warehouse

Premises plan

You must send HMRC a plan of your premises. This must show that the site is secure and how you’ll control the vaping products, people and vehicles entering or leaving the site.

You must show us the exact locations where you intend to make or store vaping products.

Business plan

You must give HMRC a business plan for your business. It should include:

• how your business is set up, who controls the business and your corporate structure
• what vaping products, and how much you plan to produce
• if you plan to export or import vaping products
• the relevant tax information, such as existing HMRC reference numbers
• your accounts for the previous financial tax year — 6 April to 5 April
• how you plan to comply with the record keeping requirements, and how we can audit your records Find out more information about how to write a business plan.

We’ll use this information to:

• check that your business is credible and will pay the right amount of tax
• check your Vaping Duty Stamps Scheme application
• work out how many vaping duty stamps you’ll be allowed to purchase In some circumstances, we may want a financial guarantee as a condition of your approval. For example, if your business is brand new or if you’ve had any tax issues in the past. This is to make sure you can still pay the right amount of tax if things go wrong.

Apply online

You’ll need to either:

• sign in with your Government Gateway user ID and password (if you do not have a user ID, you can create one when you first try to sign in)
• use your email address to get a confirmation code that you can use to sign in Apply now

After you have applied

HMRC will send you a letter confirming the details of your approval, including any extra rules you must follow. If you have applied for vaping duty stamps, we will also send you the details of the HMRC approved stamps supplier if your application is approved.

We may check for compliance at any time. If we find that you have not followed the rules, we may revoke (cancel) your approval. We will tell you the reasons why your approval has been cancelled.

Withdrawing your application

If you no longer want to be approved, you must withdraw your application as soon as possible.

Record keeping

You need to keep records if you manufacture, import, store, move, stamp or supply vaping liquids (vaping products) in the UK. This includes UK representatives acting for overseas manufacturers.

If your approval is refused

HMRC may refuse your application for approval. If we refuse your application, we’ll tell you why.

You can:

• ask us to review our decision
• appeal to an independent tribunal We may give you temporary approval during the review or appeal process if we reject (refuse) or revoke (cancel) your approval.

Updates to this page

Published 1 April 2026 Last updated 28 April 2026
1.
28 April 2026

Guidance has been updated to explain that overseas manufacturers do not need to apply for approval. Their UK duty stamps representatives need to apply for approval in order to access stamps.
2.
1 April 2026

First published.

Sign up for emails or print this page

Get emails about this page Print this page

Related content