An Post has said today that Brexit will have no impact on letters sent to and from Great Britain.
It also said that Brexit will have no impact on letters and parcels to and from Northern Ireland.
But parcels to Great Britain will require customs forms, the same as all non-EU countries, An Post said.
From January 1, charges such as VAT will apply to GB goods and electronic customs data will be required for each item in advance of shipping/posting.
An Post said it already handles more than 10 million parcels every year from non-EU countries, all of which are made available to Irish Customs for inspection.
The more than 16 million parcels that An Post receives annually from Great Britain will join this stream of incoming parcels being presented to Customs from January 1.
It said that where Customs decide that VAT or customs charges are applicable to GB goods, customers will either pay these charges in their shopping basket to the online retailer, or directly via An Post online or at a post office in advance of delivery.
Meanwhile, 95% of online shopping received by An Post from Great Britain will be delivered as normal and An Post said it has been working closely with the UK online retailers for whom it delivers to put in place as seamless process for Irish online shoppers.
Most UK online retailers for whom An Post delivers have signed up to a digital solution that enables the shopper to include all charges in the shopping basket at the point of purchase, so that the items may be delivered as normal to the customer.
The remaining 5% will require customers to pay the customs/tariff charges in advance of delivery.
An Post said it has built a new online portal to enable customers to pay charges in a few clicks and the item will be delivered as normal. Alternatively, customers can pay charges at any post office. Charges will no longer be collected at the door by postal delivery staff, it added.
But An Post's virtual address product, AddressPal, will be impacted by Brexit and Customs 2020 changes.
It said that existing AddressPal UK customers must register a home delivery address on their account for the purpose of paying any charges due. Some customers currently have a local post office listed as their delivery address, but this can no longer be used as the customer's registered address.
An AddressPal UK service fee of €6.50 will include a range of delivery options (once customs charges are cleared) including delivery to a local Post Office or to a neighbour, which will be offered by text message to customers.
Charges and an administration fee of €3.50 will apply to all items.
An Post said it will monitor the impact of changes on the service over the coming months.
"In addition to making preparations for Brexit, An Post has also been preparing for the single biggest change to the customs regime in the history of the State: the implementation of Customs 2020, the EU programme to enable national customs administrations to create and exchange information electronically," Cyril McGrane, Director of International Trade, An Post said.
"Our priority is to make the changes as easy as possible for customers," he added.
