U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee is expected to approve this week a number of additional recommendations regarding in-bond shipments.
Following regulatory changes issued in September 2017, CBP began mandating the electronic filing and reporting of in-bond arrival, exportation, and diversion in July 2019 (except for shipments arriving in and transported through the U.S. by air, which remain paper-based at present). However, there remain concerns within the trade community over issues such as the requirements for six-digit HTSUS number reporting and FIRMS code reporting for in-bond shipment destination location, as well as the legal transfer of liability among carriers when in-bond shipment possession changes to a succeeding carrier.
Ahead of a Dec. 13 COAC meeting the committee’s In-Bond Working Group said CBP is continuing to work to enhance existing ACE in-bond reports to improve CBP’s enforcement posture and offer better visibility into in-bond usage, including the creation (expected soon) of new reports accessible to filers and carriers showing in-bond entries that will be due for arrival in five and ten days. In addition, CBP has formally initiated a proposed rulemaking that would establish new and improved efficiencies within the in-bond program.
COAC made three recommendations earlier this year to further improve in-bond processes and the working group has now developed two additional ones, which are expected to be approved by the full COAC this week. Both have to do with the ACE auto-matching process, which compares the ACE cargo’s weight, quantity, and bill of lading number with the information submitted on the in-bond entry.
The working group notes that the information submitted within each filing must be an exact match for ACE to flip the cargo’s release type to a pre-filed in-bond, and any discrepancies will result in an incorrect ACE cargo release type and cause the in-bond entry to become stuck on file with CBP. CBP is therefore being urged to (1) amend the auto-matching parameters for in-bond shipments to account for weight discrepancies when converting between kilograms and pounds and (2) schedule outreach sessions (i.e., webinars) to inform carriers of in-bond requirements, liability, and consequences of non-compliance.
For more information on utilizing in-bond capabilities, please contact attorney Lenny Feldman at (305) 894-1011 or via email.
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