U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a notice stating that effective January 30, 2012, the Office of International Trade/Trade Policy and Programs is no longer processing Remote Location Filing applications. This process has been transitioned to the client representatives within the ACE Business Office. The client representatives will be responsible for determining the filer’s ability to transmit via the Electronic Invoice Program (EIP), determine RLF eligibility, and convey results, once the filer has demonstrated it meets certain thresholds.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a February 16, 2012 version of its "Technical" Frequently Asked Questions document on the ACE Simplified Entry (SE) Pilot for air cargo. The new version has three new Q&As on updating and resending SEs, and four news Q&As on deleting SEs. The other sections of the FAQs have not been updated for new information.
At the February 21, 2012 COAC meeting, CBP officials said the agency plans to issue an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) to gather ideas on its planned re-write of the Customs broker regulations in 19 CFR Part 111. The ANPR will also ensure that all of the broker community has ample opportunity to provide comments and suggestions.
On February 21, 2012, the Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of Customs and Border Protection (COAC) met in Washington D.C. to hear an update from the Broker Workgroup1 on CBP's plans to allow customs brokers to pre-certify Importer Self-Assessment (ISA)2 applicants.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted a February 3, 2012 version of its frequently asked questions document on containers considered to be instruments of international traffic (e.g. reusable containers) that are imported into the U.S. with residual chemicals, cargo, goods, etc. The new version extensively revises and reorganizes its information on the upcoming requirement that residue in IIT be manifested, classified, and entered, with detailed specifics on (1) what carriers and importers of record will be responsible for, and (2) the procedures for manifesting and entering IIT with residual cargo, among other changes.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a CSMS message announcing that it is still accepting registrations for its March 6-8, 2012 seminar at the National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA) meeting in Arlington, VA that will cover programming changes for existing and new functionality scheduled to be delivered as part of the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE). The seminar will target ocean and rail software developers and ABI software developers. Presentations will focus on: (i) Changes to CAMIR and X12 message formats required for the deployment of ACE Ocean and Rail Manifest, mandatory ABI changes required for this deployment, and the decommissioning of the ACS Ocean and Rail Manifest system; and (ii) Current and future ACE deployments including ACE Entry Summary Filing, Post Summary Corrections, PGA Message Set, Document Image System, Simplified Entry/Cargo Release, and Export Manifest. Registration is available at http://www.ncbfaa.org/.
On February 21, 2012, the Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of Customs and Border Protection (COAC) met in Washington D.C. to hear updates on ACE and other projects from government officials as well as reports from its various committees. With respect to ACE, government officials announced that (1) CBP will have six major ACE drops over next 6-8 months, (2) CBP is still looking at how to fix the ACE summary “edits” problem, (3) ACE is critically short on funding for further development, (4) ACE will soon be reviewed by DHS from a financial investment perspective, and (5) the main software developer’s contract has run its term. Attendees also gave an update on ACE Simplified Entry and Summary, and ACE for exports.
The Los Angeles/Long Beach Seaport has issued a Public Bulletin announce that it will hold an updated Steel Identification, Classification, and Trade Law seminar on March 27-29, 2012. The seminar program, presented by technical, commercial, and legal experts from the steel industry, aims to increase the knowledge of the trade and the Customs broker community. It will include material on fraud, circumvention, evasion, and current issues. The seminar will be held at the Port of Long Beach Harbor Department Administration Building, 6th floor auditorium, 925 Harbor Plaza, Long Beach, CA. Registration is required by March 5, 2012 to attend this free seminar. Public Bulletin #LA12-004 and seminar registration form are available via email by sending a request to documents@brokerpower.com.
The Department of Homeland Security has released a report on its accomplishments in 2011, in connection with a speech by Secretary Janet Napolitano on the progress DHS has made that year. Among other accomplishments, the report notes that (1) the Container Security Initiative is now active at more than 50 overseas ports, and (2) the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) has grown to more than 10,200 Certified Partners worldwide.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted another updated version of its February 2012 "Trade Transformation" document. The revised document no longer states that testing of the Simplified Entry process in the air cargo environment will begin mid-February followed by production in late February to early March. The updated document also no longer states that the first Simplified Entry is expected to be filed (by the trade) in March 2012. The revised version has also added back in a listing of the locations for the two established and seven planned industry Centers of Excellence and Expertise (CEEs).