The Supreme Court on May 26 denied a petition to hear an appeal of Trek Leather, setting in stone a controversial court ruling that some importers fear will expand the liability of corporate officers and employees for customs violations. Tucked without comment in a lengthy order sheet also denying a hearing to scores of other cases (here), the denial of certiorari lets stand a September decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that found Harish Shadadpuri liable for penalties for his corporation’s failure to declare assists on entry documentation, even though the corporation acted as importer of record (see 14091703).
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published its Spring 2015 regulatory agenda for CBP (here). The agenda does not include any new trade-related rulemakings, though a planned rulemaking on customs broker continuing education requirements was moved to among the agency's "long-term actions" without a target date. It also continues to include mentions of Importer Security Filing (ISF) rulemakings.
The performance of customs regimes are often greatly affected by the work of customs brokers, said World Customs Organization Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya while speaking to the International Federation of Customs Brokers Associations. The WCO is surveying its members on institutional frameworks for customs brokers in consideration of the "need to maintain a quality service," said the WCO (here). The IFCBA "expressed an interest in working with Customs to adjust their way of doing business to the evolving trade environment, including electronic data transfer," said the WCO. "They also discussed the need to provide capacity building for brokers and to improve integrity."
CBP posted a long set of questions and answers on the agency's updated approach to Importer Security Filing (ISF) enforcement (here). The questions were submitted during a recent webinar on the new ISF approach (see 1505060013). Among other things, CBP addressed the liability for customs brokers for ISF filing. "The ISF Importer is responsible for the timely, accurate and complete filing," said CBP. "The [customs house broker] as the ISF Filer does not [bear] this liability from CBP’s perspective."
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for May 11-15 in case they were missed.
CBP posted a draft version of long-awaited Automated Commercial Environment cargo release business processes on May 15 (here). The draft is a "living document" and CBP will consider submitted comments for the next draft, said the agency (here). The processes document is expected to function as the "cornerstone" for both the trade and port personnel, an agency official recently said (see 1504270018).
The Senate Customs Reauthorization legislation is only a “piecemeal” approach to strengthening U.S. trade remedy law, and the bill could hamper U.S. industry and CBP’s ability to monitor U.S. imports, said a group of importers in a recent letter to the House Ways and Means Committee. The American Apparel and Footwear Association, the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America and the International Wood Products Association, among others, signed onto the letter.
CBP began use of the Broker Known Importer Program (BKIP), said the agency in a CSMS message (here). BKIP allows customs brokers to indicate to the agency that an importer is "known" and was advised of "compliance responsibilities," said CBP. The voluntary program will "create a framework whereby customs brokers could discuss with their importer clients in greater depth the importer’s trade activities in the context of import regulations." The BKIP functionality is already included within the Automated Commercial Environment so "brokers can "transmit a Known Importer indicator when filing an entry on behalf of a Known Importer client," said CBP. The program is the result of a National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America initiative (see 1504220071). While not required for BKIP, the NCBFAA offers a nine-page questionnaire (here) that brokers can go over with their importers in order to begin using the program.
Electronic filing of certificates of compliance could create a host of data entry issues for customs brokers, making the certificate registry approach contemplated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission an “attractive” option, said Amy Magnus, director-customs and compliance at A.N. Deringer, during a meeting between the agency and a CBP Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations working group set up to address certificate filing.
In a world where decisions about people's lives are made by secret algorithms, anti-discrimination, due process and basic fairness protections are lost, University of Maryland law professor Frank Pasquale said Monday at a Center for Digital Democracy and U.S. Public Interest Research Group event. Mobile providers, cable companies, carriers, search engine companies, retail and content websites and social networking sites collect data, but it doesn’t stop there, Pasquale said. Data is swapped and sold among third and even fourth parties, he said, making the spread of data “un-monitorable and uncontrollable by any individual.”