China Wooden Bedroom Furniture: Whalen's Upholstered Headboards Not Subject to AD Duties
Whalen Furniture Manufacturing’s upholstered headboards are not subject to antidumping duties under the order on wooden bedroom furniture from China (A-570-890), said the Commerce Department in an Oct. 28 final scope ruling. Although the scope of the AD duty order only explicitly excludes entire beds that are fully upholstered, the fact that Whalen's fully upholstered headboards would be the only wooden part of an otherwise metal bed means they should be excluded as well, Commerce said.
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Whalen’s headboards are completely upholstered. They consist of a wooden frame stuffed with foam padding, and are entirely covered in synthetic fabric. There is no exposed wood. The upholstered headboards are specifically designed and marketed for use with a rolling metal bed frame, with pre-drilled holes placed to fit a standard rolling metal bed frame. However, the headboards will be imported and sold separately from the metal bed frames.
Whalen argued its headboards qualify for an exclusion in the scope of the wooden bedroom furniture AD duty order for completely upholstered beds. Specifically, the order excludes wooden beds that are “completely upholstered, i.e., containing filling material and completely covered in sewn genuine leather, synthetic leather, or natural or synthetic decorative fabric.” To qualify for the exclusion, the entire bed must be upholstered except for the bed feet.
Commerce ruled that, although the scope exclusion only explicitly covers entire beds and not parts of beds, Whalen’s headboards would nonetheless be covered by the exclusion. Given that the headboard is designed to be attached to a standard rolling metal frame, the rest of any bed attached to Whalen’s headboard would be made of metal. The only part of the bed potentially covered by the wooden bedroom furniture would be the headboard, Commerce said. Because only the part of the bed made substantially out of wood must be completely upholstered to be excluded from the wooden bedroom furniture order, Commerce found Whalen’s upholstered headboards to be outside of the order’s scope, and not subject to AD duties.
Email ITTNews@warren-news.com for a copy of this scope ruling.