Mexico’s recently-passed tax and customs law reform won’t have much direct effect on customs clearance, but it will wreak havoc on the balance sheets of many maquiladora factories along the border, said several Mexican customs and tax lawyers. The reform, which cleared its last hurdle in the Mexican senate Oct. 31, will introduce electronic audits, new self-disclosure provisions, and minor changes to the Mexican customs brokerage regime, the lawyers said. The law’s biggest impact on trade, however, will be from increased taxation of maquiladoras -- the bonded manufacturing facilities along the U.S.-Mexico border that produce goods for export -- through the imposition of a value added tax on temporary imports and the end of tax breaks.
Kim Campbell is the new board chair of the Canadian Society of Customs Brokers. She has been a board member since 2011, and is principal of Mkmarin Trade Services.
The National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America scheduled a webinar on the status of eBond. The webinar is scheduled for 2 p.m. Dec. 12.
PortMiami formed a new task-force, along with CBP, called the "Transshipment Committee," officials there confirmed. The goal is to develop a pilot program for a "transshipment inspection protocol" for PortMiami. Officials said CBP’s increased inspections of transshipped goods since 9/11 results in cargo delays and added expenses. The goal is for terminals to provide CBP a list of all in-transit merchandise in advance, and for CBP to coordinate the expediting review of in-transit merchandise. CBP will also coordinate physical exams to assure goods are released expeditiously, officials said. As part of the effort, CBP assigned Robert Martin, chief of ATCET to work on the project, so terminal operators can directly contact Martin about delays. Kenneth Haeffner, the APD of Trade for CBP will handle “outreach” and work with the Florida Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association on a class to assure they understand all in bond requirements. The first quarterly meeting was Nov. 15, with the next likely in February, they said.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Nov. 12-15 in case they were missed.
Nearly one-third of exporters have lost sales because of U.S. export regulations, according to the CBP Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) 2013 Export Survey (here). COAC members discussed the survey, the first of its kind, at a meeting on Nov. 15 in Washington, D.C. Two of the main takeaways from the survey were the impact of export regulations on exporters and freight forwarders and the high cost of exports held at ports. One way the government could mitigate these negative outcomes is through flexible programs that target risk based on industry sector, said CBP’s Dan Baldwin.
CBP modified the National Customs Automation Program test that allows importers to use the Automated Broker Interface to file post-summary corrections (PSCs) of certain pre-liquidation ACE entry summaries (ESAR IV). The modifications to the ESAR IV test program "will allow filers greater access to data filed in ACE as it relates to the original entry and any subsequent PSC, limit certain additional data elements from being changed via PSC, and preclude a PSC on any entry that has been protested or where merchandise covered by the original entry has been conditionally released and its right to admission has not been determined," said CBP. CBP has been considering how to handle the question of greater data access since soon after the test was announced in 2011 (see 11081219).
The Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) Role of the Broker working group recommended that it suspend efforts to draft requirements for certain information collection on importers by customs brokers until the agency finishes a proposal on updates to the Importer ID Input Record (CBP Form 5106). The recommendation, voiced during the Nov. 15 COAC meeting, would allow the COAC to see which proposed Form 5106 changes overlap with the bona fides efforts. A CBP report recently released on the issue pointed outlined some of the difficulties the working group faced in developing a standard of bona fides requirements (see 13111225).
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The National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA) applauded the Food and Drug Administration’s proposed definition of importer for the purposes of the Foreign Supplier Verification Program, in comments to agency submitted Nov. 14. In its July proposed rule, FDA proposed to define the importer as “the person who caused a food to be imported,” rather than as the CBP importer of record, because the nominal importer of record may not know much about the product (see 13072628). “This is an important distinction and we are encouraged that the FDA showed such a clear understanding of the nuances of the supply chain,” said NCBFAA. But while NCBFAA praised the agency’s adoption of its preferred importer definition, the association raised some concerns with implementation.