A key Brexit lorry park will not be fully ready until February, it has emerged.
The Sevington site being paved over in Ashford, Kent, is one of seven huge truck stops due to be ready from January 1.
But while it will be ready to hold lorries from January 1, it will not be ready to do customs checks after being delayed by heavy rain.
Instead trucks will need to use the nearby Waterbrook site, another one of the seven lorry parks, for customs checks.
Ashford MP Damian Green told KentOnline: "Because of the rain, they are going to stand up the nearby Waterbrook site and operate it as a common transit convention site.
"HMRC activities that would've taken place at Sevington will be carried out there instead.
"They've said it should be for a maximum of up to eight weeks from January - so it should be finished by the end of February.
"But they are committed to the Sevington site as the permanent base."
Importers and exporters will have new paperwork from January 1, due to Britain leaving the EU’s single market and customs union.
Such checks will happen whether or not the UK secures a trade deal with the EU.
However, without a trade deal, these checks could be more onerous.
Plans for 10 "inland sites" were unveiled in October to ensure the extra checks could be done far from ports to lessen a backlog.
Seven, including both Sevington and Waterbrook in Ashford, were due to be ready from January.
But a Department for Transport spokesperson said: “From 1st January customs checks on HGV’s will be taking place at the Ashford Waterbrook site before permanently moving to the Sevington site in February 2021 if not before.
“The Sevington site will open as planned on the 1st January to manage traffic should there be disruption.”
Government documents had said Common Transit Convention processes would begin at both Ashford sites from January 1.
However, the government insisted "it has always been the intention" to have customs checks at either one site or the other at the start.
Areas around Britain’s largest ports like Dover, Kent, have spent months preparing for disruption.
Kent has a moveable barrier to queue lorries on the motorway, and trucks leaving Britain will need a ‘Kent passport’ to enter the county.
But Maidstone Grammar School, which is near Kent’s M20 motorway, is staying shut for two extra days in January to avoid parents being caught up in traffic.
The government says it’s hired 900 more officers to man the border and 1,100 are to be recruited by March.
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