As a detection officer or customs officer, you would work in airports and ports to collect customs duty and prevent smuggling and illegal trade. You might:

As a detection officer or customs officer, you would work in airports and ports to collect customs duty and prevent smuggling and illegal trade. You might:

· search luggage, vehicles and travellers

· check customs documents

· question people who have been found with illegal items or excess goods

· arrest and charge people

· prepare reports and witness statements

· take on specialist roles such as dog handling or undercover and surveillance work.

When necessary, you would attend court as a witness, and work closely with other agencies like the police and the Home Office.

Skills and Knowledge

· good judgement

· confident decision making ability

· accuracy and attention to detail

· the ability to work alone and also as part of a team

· good listening and questioning skills

· a tactful but assertive manner

· honesty and fairness in applying rules.

The Job Description
Officers working for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) collect a range of taxes and duties, control imported and exported goods, and prevent banned items from entering or leaving the country.

As a border protection (customs) officer, you would work in airports, ports and freight terminals to collect customs duty and prevent smuggling and illegal trade.

Typical responsibilities:

search luggage, vehicles and travellers
check customs documents
question people who have been found with illegal items or excess goods
arrest and charge people
prepare reports and witness statements
take on specialist roles such as dog handling or undercover and surveillance work.
As an excise officer or VAT assurance officer, you would make sure that businesses pay the right amount of excise duty and/or VAT, by:

visiting businesses to audit their accounts
advising traders about the law, and how to improve their accounting methods
preparing reports
taking legal action to make businesses pay what they owe.
In all cases you would occasionally attend court as a witness, and work closely with other agencies like the police and the Home Office.

Person Specification
The key personal attributes of good customs and excise officers include:

be able to analyse information and make decisions
work accurately and pay attention to detail
be able to work alone and also as part of a team
have good listening and questioning skills
be able to present information in a clear and logical way
be tactful and polite
be honest and fair in applying rules
have good mathematical skills, for examining accounts and making calculations.

How to become a customs and excise officer
Border protection, excise and VAT assurance officer jobs are at HMRC’s Officer grade. You would normally join as an administrative assistant or assistant officer and earn promotion to officer, although HMRC sometimes recruits directly into officer grade.

To join at Officer grade you are likely to need five GCSEs (A-C) including English and maths, plus two A levels or equivalent qualifications. You will usually need two GCSEs (A-C) to join HMRC as an administrative assistant, and five GCSEs (A-C) including maths and English for assistant officer jobs.

However, if you do not have these qualifications, you may be able to instead take a selection test to prove your skills and abilities in areas like teamwork and communication. Please check entry requirements for each vacancy.

You must also meet the Civil Service nationality requirement. All jobs are open to British nationals and many are also open to Commonwealth citizens or European Union nationals.

Training and Development
You would be trained on the job through a mixture of structured in-house training courses and learning from experienced staff. Training usually lasts around nine months, and may include some residential training courses.

You are encouraged to identify your own training needs throughout your career, as part of an appraisal and staff development programme.

The Pay (a rough guide)
Salaries at administrative and assistant grades are between £12,734 and £18,716 a year.
Officers earn between £19,587 and £25,206 a year.
Salaries after promotion to higher officer grades are between £24,513 and £38,099 a year.

Job Prospects
Jobs are advertised on the HMRC and Civil Service Recruitment Gateway websites, in the local and national press and in Jobcentre Plus.

There is a clear promotion structure in the Civil Service. You could stay within HMRC and progress through the grades, or you could choose to transfer to other Civil Service departments and agencies. You may need to relocate to gain promotion.

Duties

Border services officers protect Canadian society, the environment and industry by preventing the illegal importation of items (for example, non-prescription drugs, guns, hate literature) and guarding against the introduction of human, animal and plant diseases into our society.

In the course of enforcing laws relating to customs and excise, border services officers inspect goods imported personally and commercially, and deal directly with the travelling public at airports, seaports and highway border points. They may be the first designated immigration officials newcomers meet and therefore act as goodwill ambassadors as well as enforce Canadian laws and regulations.

In general, border services officers:

• examine documents and interview travellers and importers
• detain people who may pose a threat to Canada
• remove people who are inadmissible to Canada (for example, those involved in terrorism, organized crime, war crimes or crimes against humanity)
• examine personal and commercial shipments, monitor the movement of goods and intercept illegal goods entering or leaving the country
• use established rules to determine taxable value and applicable duty and sales tax rates, and ensure correct duties and taxes are collected on imported goods
• protect food safety and the environment by stopping prohibited or hazardous products arriving at air, land or sea ports
• conduct investigations and enforce customs regulations
• explain the laws they enforce to members of the public
• add information to a computerized information database.

· Know proper English language usage. Pick up the following recommended books: "Chicago Manual of Style: The Essential Guide for Writers, Editors and Publishers" and the most recent edition of "The Elements of Style."

· 4

Study US culture, history, foreign policy, politics, world history and world geography. Read books such as "A Narrative History of an American Republic" by J.W. Davidson and "The Politics of United States Foreign Policy" by J. Rosati.

· 5

Identify US Consular and Immigration duties and policies. The US State Department recommends the following for these subjects: "Immigration Law Stories" by D. Martin and P. Schuck and "Laws Harsh as Tigers" by L. Saylor.

Read more: How to Prepare for the Foreign Service Officer Exam | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/how_2106459_prepare-foreign-service-officer-exam.html#ixzz1nbFiorNe

Дата добавления: 2015-11-04