Customs Specialist

Kuehne+Nagel; Birmingham; On-site; GBP 30,000 - 40,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Kuehne+Nagel pension plan

Route 2 Rewards scheme

Employee assistance program

Job summary

Kuehne+Nagel in Birmingham is seeking a Customs Specialist tasked with optimizing logistics for global supply chains. This role involves identifying and resolving exceptions in processes and engaging with various stakeholders to maintain compliance and operational excellence.

The ideal candidate will have strong knowledge of customs operations, excellent communication skills, and a commitment to high-quality service. Benefits include a contributory pension plan, discounts, and an employee assistance program to support work-life balance.

Qualifications

• Strong knowledge of customs operations, export, transit, and compliance requirements.
• Excellent communication skills across teams and stakeholders.
• Strong customer service focus and commitment to delivering high-quality support.
• Proven ability to prioritize workload and manage multiple tasks.
• Exceptional attention to detail and accuracy in documentation.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with a proactive approach.
• Effective stakeholder management and relationship building.
• Flexible and adaptable to changing business needs.

Responsibilities

• Identify exceptions in processes, systems, or transactions.
• Efficiently resolve exceptions and prevent recurrence.
• Provide internal team audit support for compliance.
• Coordinate with customers and hauliers as required.
• Maintain accurate records and report resolution effectiveness.
• Support team members on exception handling procedures.
• Escalate complex exceptions to management.

Skills

Customs operations

Communication skills

Customer service focus

Attention to detail

Analytical skills

Problem-solving skills

Stakeholder management

Flexibility

Job description

As a Customs Specialist at Kuehne+Nagel, your job is to optimise logistics to keep our global supply chains running smoothly. But the impact of your work goes beyond that. In fact, your expertise makes both special and ordinary moments possible for people around the world. For example, your work could ensure that a global product launch happens on time—such as ethically sourced beauty and bath products stocked at local stores for your loved one's valued self‑care routine. It is import and export work, but it is also so much more than we imagine. You will be working within a team of Exception Management Specialists, working within defined processes and procedures, operating within service level agreements, and prioritizing accordingly, playing a critical role in monitoring systems and other tools to identify, classify and resolve issues and exceptions efficiently. You will also be working closely with key cross functional teams to gain feedback and apply learnings to be pro‑active as well as put forward preventative actions to ensure operational excellence through root‑cause analysis.

How you create impact

• Identify exceptions within processes, systems, or transactions and monitor data and systems to detect anomalies, analyse, root cause, classify and prioritise based on severity & impact.
• Efficiently resolve exceptions & prevent recurrence – developing corrective actions for immediate resolution, collaborate with relevant teams to resolve in a timely manner, propose longer term improvements to prevent in future.
• Provide internal team audit support to ensure compliance.
• Coordinate with all other relevant parties as required eg Customer, haulier and others.
• Maintain accurate records of issues and of steps taken for resolution and provide reporting for analysis of resolution effectiveness.
• Accurate tracking & reporting of exceptions.
• Provide support to team members and end users on exception handling procedures and standard customs tasks.
• Escalate complex and critical exceptions to the Exceptions Management Lead.

What we would like you to bring

• Strong knowledge of customs operations, export, transit, and compliance requirements.
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to engage effectively across teams and stakeholders.
• Strong customer service focus and commitment to delivering high‑quality support.
• Proven ability to prioritise workload and manage multiple tasks in a fast‑paced environment.
• Exceptional attention to detail and accuracy in documentation and data management.
• Strong analytical and problem‑solving skills with a proactive approach to issue resolution.
• Effective stakeholder management skills, with the ability to build collaborative relationships.
• Flexible and adaptable, with the ability to respond to changing business needs.

What's in it for you

If you would like to become a valued member of our team, we will make sure that you’re rewarded for your commitment and expertise. You can join the contributory Kuehne+Nagel pension plan and enjoy our Route 2 Rewards scheme, which offers everything from discounts, benefit information, recognition and its own wellbeing centre. We care for our colleagues (and their immediate family) with our employee assistance programme providing access to 24/7 GP, legal and financial advice along with mental health counselling. All of this to help you live a happier and healthier life. As proud holders of the Gold Covenant, we are a forces‑friendly employer who recognise the skills, expertise and value service leavers bring to our organisation.

Who we are

Logistics shapes everyday life - from the goods we consume to the healthcare we rely on. At Kuehne+Nagel, your work goes beyond logistics; it enables both ordinary and special moments in the lives of people around the world. As a global leader with a strong heritage and a vision to move the world forward, we offer a safe, stable environment where your career can make a real difference. Whether we help deliver life‑saving medicines, develop sustainable transportation solutions or support our local communities, your career will contribute to more than you can imagine.