U.S. Customs and Border Protection is advising the trade of future changes to the ABI Harmonized Tariff Extract reference file and to the ABI HTS Query transaction records to display new output records that will identify tariff numbers that have PGA (Participating Government Agency) indicators associated with the tariff number. CBP is also providing the formats for the new record identifiers, for trade programming purposes.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a press release on CBP Commissioner Bersin's opening of the Commercial Operations Advisory Committee’s (COAC) second meeting held in Long Beach, CA on August 18, 2011. At the meeting, Commissioner Bersin emphasized that partnerships with other countries, other governmental agencies (OGAs), and the trade community are essential for further success in moving forward. Meeting participants also discussed the management by account pilot programs, the Center of Excellence and Expertise (CEE) and Account Executive, which will likely become part of the CEE on October 1. Other topics on the agenda included simplified entry and processing, the role of the broker revision project, and updates on the progress of work being done on the land border security initiatives, air cargo security, Automated Commercial Environment (ACE), etc.
At the August 18, 2011 COAC meeting, CBP officials and COAC members provided an update of their work on CBP’s broker revision project, which could include more robust broker vetting of importers and restricting the off-shoring of customs business.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a correction, effective August 24, 2011, of its final rule on the discontinuation of electronic courtesy notices of liquidation to importers of record whose entry summaries are filed in the Automated Broker Interface. In the preamble of the final rule, CBP mistakenly said that Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism members may receive Import Trade Activity (ITRAC) report for free. According to CBP, Importer Self Assessment (ISA), not C-TPAT members, receive free ITRAC reports.
On August 18, 2011, a COAC1 meeting was held where CBP and COAC members discussed the two management by account pilots -- the Center for Excellence and Expertise (CEE) pilot for pharmaceuticals and the Account Executive (AE) pilot for electronics. Among other things, CBP said it plans to create 8 to 10 more CEEs to focus on additional industries, and to make AE a component of CEEs.
On August 18, 2011, CBP and other officials presented their draft proposals for modeling new simplified entry, summary, and financial processes for imports at a COAC1 meeting, achieving their first project milestone on time. Finalized models are due by September 16, with a final report and proposal slated for delivery on September 30.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection stated on August 19, 2011 that it was set to deploy new code for capabilities related to rail and sea manifest (M1) on August 20, 2011, and that there would also be code for new ACE Portal capabilities that would be available to the trade in a phased approach. However, CBP issued a new message on August 21 stating that due to an unanticipated technical difficulty, deployment would be delayed one week. CBP also stated that a CSMS message would be issued with the new deployment date as soon as the schedule is confirmed.
On August 18, 2011, a COAC1 meeting was held in Long Beach, CA where CBP and COAC members discussed plans to develop recommendations for broker reform by October, roll out full-blown Centers for Excellence and Expertise in October, pilot simplified entry and financial process in October, expand the air cargo advance screening pilot to additional types of carriers and countries, and add export processing to the Automated Commercial Environment.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted an updated version of its spreadsheet of ACE ESAR A2.2 (Initial Entry Types) programming issues.
On August 16, 2011, U.S. Customs and Border Protection posted an update on the status of the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE). CBP outlines and provides certain statistics on deployed ACE capabilities, such as ACE Secure Data Portal, Periodic Monthly Statement (PMS), Participating Government Agency access to ACE, electronic filing of e-Manifest: Truck, entry summaries, and Importer Security Filing (ISF).