NCBFAA Gives CBP its ACE Priorities for Brokers - Says Program is at a Crossroads

NCBFAA states its paper focuses on those areas of change that provide the most meaningful functionality for the funds remaining and are foundational to further ACE development.

ACE is at a Crossroads, Initial Funding Almost Gone

According to NCBFAA, ACE is at a crossroads. CBP is nearing the end of the initial funding for the ACE project and there is still much left to be done. NCBFAA believes this is an appropriate time to share its thoughts on the best ways to proceed with ACE development.

ACS Should be Decommissioned, Entry Related Programs Should Move to ACE

NCBFAA states that CBP should focus on decommissioning the Automated Commercial System and moving most entry related programs over to ACE with only the minimal changes already agreed upon through the Trade Support Network process.

Further Development of ACE Portal Should be Delayed

In addition, CBP should delay further trade portal development until all data necessary to support the views and reports originate from data native to ACE.

NCBFAA has been frustrated by the decision to develop the trade portals prior to developing the release and entry systems in ACE. Release and entry are the core programs that provide the data that flows to the portal. Had CBP first completed Multi-Modal Manifest, Release, and Entry Summary in ACE, a number of better results would have been realized.

NCBFAA Priorities are Organized into 3 Groupings

NCBFAA's recommendations are organized into three groupings reflecting their priority to the trade. The following are highlights of their recommendations:

First Priority Recommendations

RLF for ACE entry summaries. One area of interest to the brokerage industry is the expansion of Remote Location Filing (RLF) for all types of entries as they are implemented.

MMM. It is critical that CBP get back on track with a true Multi-Modal Manifest (MMM). NCBFAA states that this must be finished so that CBP can move forward as quickly as possible towards another key priority for brokers: release. (Release application development was bundled under MMM.)

House bills of lading (HBL) must be a part of this for all modes. NCBFAA was concerned when it learned that e-Manifest: Ocean is being rolled out without the inclusion of some HBL capabilities.

Release. To get customs brokers to fully embrace ACE, it is critical that CBP recognize the integration of both release and summary in a broker's operations. Delay in developing release in ACE will delay brokers' participation.

Release should be rolled out to include all data required by Participating Government Agencies (PGAs) prior to release and CBP should be the releasing agency. Receiving a (conditional) release from CBP should be the signal that the goods may proceed into the commerce of the U.S.

PGA/ITDS data. NCBFAA states that recent activities by other agencies underscore the need for CBP to quickly and fully develop "one window" import data capability to relieve the pressure on other agencies looking to satisfy their data requirements through non-ACE/ITDS solutions. Specifically, NCBFAA wants CBP to focus on requirements for:

Edits. Many NCBFAA members have said that they will not participate in ACE until certain edits that were agreed to by the trade and CBP are restored in ACE. In addition, NCBFAA states that these edits must be functioning in ACE before ACS is turned off for each entry type.

Second Priority Recommendations

Liquidation and related post-summary CBP actions. Clear, reliable, and legal notice of liquidation (including reliquidation, suspension, extension, etc.) is of great importance to the importer, broker, surety, customs attorney and CBP. These liquidation programs and reports work well now and should be ported to ACE.

Warehouse, withdrawal, rewarehouse, etc. There are significant numbers of these entries and programming is needed to move these processes to ACE. Warehouse entries and withdrawals need to be evaluated as an inventory management process and decisions need to be made as to what extent, if any, CBP would take responsibility for these inventories.

Drawback. Once new drawback legislation is enacted, NCBFAA believes that there will be an increased use of drawback entries. CBP should wait until this legislation passes and then take a close look at what is needed and where these entries logically fall in ACE development.

Third Priority Recommendations

Quota entries. With quota activity so significantly reduced, CBP should give priority to other types of entries.

Reconciliation Entries. The current system works adequately and can be maintained. There are still some outstanding differences between the trade needs from aggregate reconciliation entry and what CBP said they are willing to deliver. The trade and CBP should jointly work through these issues prior to initiation of any programming.

Balance of entry types. The priority for residual entry types required to be ported from ACS to ACE should be determined near the end of the work on the earlier priorities NCBFAA proposed. These include, but are not limited to:

FTZ Entries

Appraisement Entries

Quota Entries (if, as indicated above, they maintain their low level of activity)

See NCBFAA's white paper for details, additional ACE information, other issues brought up by NCBFAA, etc.

(See ITT's Online Archives or 06/26/09 news, 09062605, for BP summary of CBP announcing that it was delaying the deployment of functionality to provide for the RLF of ACE entry summaries.)

White paper (issued 07/29/09) available at http://www.ncbfaa.org/files/NCBFAAACEWhitePaper.pdf