In early March 2008, U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a Truck Manifest CSMS message on the Automated Commercial Environment electronic manifest update that is currently scheduled to be implemented on April 5, 2008.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted three additional chapters to its "ACE ABI CATAIR" document that it is building to replace the current Customs and Trade Automated Interface Requirements (CATAIR) document.
The Journal of Commerce reports that according to the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports' harbor commissions, the ports can operate under two separate Clean Truck Programs, even though they comprise a single harbor complex, as their fees, timeline for retiring old trucks and deadline for reducing pollution are the same. (JoC, dated 03/27/08, www.joc.com)
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a Truck Manifest CSMS message stating that the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) Certification Environment will be unavailable for trade testing on April 15, 2008 from 7:00 a.m. EDT until 11:00 p.m. EDT. (CSMS 08-000044, dated 03/28/08, available at http://apps.cbp.gov/csms/viewmssg.asp?Recid=17050&page=&srch_argv=&srchtype=&btype=&sortby=&sby)
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a news release announcing that the next phase of the CBP.gov Web site upgrade is to be launched April 4, 2008 and will feature new second-tier feature pages providing better display of information on CBP's major missions of border security, trade and travel, as well as CBP news and career information. This upgrade also will introduce a streamlined menu bar and footers, as well as more photos and graphics.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued its weekly tariff rate quota and tariff preference level commodity report as of March 24, 2008. This report includes TRQs on various products such as beef, sugar, dairy products, peanuts, cotton, cocoa products, tobacco, certain BFTA, DR-CAFTA, Israel FTA, JFTA, MFTA, SFTA, UAFTA (AFTA) and UCFTA (Chile FTA) non-textile TRQs, etc. Each report also includes the AGOA, ATPDEA, BFTA, DR-CAFTA, CBTPA, Haitian HOPE, MFTA, NAFTA, SFTA, and UCFTA TPLs and TRQs for qualifying apparel and/or other textile articles, the TRQs on worsted wool fabrics, etc. (CBP's weekly TRQ/TPL commodity report, dated 03/24/08, available at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/import/textiles_and_quotas/commodity/)
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a Truck Manifest CSMS message with an attachment providing further guidance on the upcoming April 5, 2008 ACE e-Manifest update that will give truck carriers (and customs brokers) the capability to arrive in-bonds at destination by equipment (trailer/container, etc.), export in-bonds that have previously arrived by in-bond bills of lading and container/equipment, and to cancel in-bond arrivals and exports.
On March 3, 2008, U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a Truck Manifest CSMS message announcing that the Automated Commercial Environment electronic manifest update that will give truck carriers and customs brokers the capability to arrive in-bonds1 at destination by equipment (trailer/container, etc.), export in-bonds that have previously arrived by in-bond bills of lading and container/equipment, and to cancel in-bond arrivals and exports, has been delayed to April 5, 2008.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued an ABI CSMS message announcing that the problem involving requests for prior notice (PN) confirmation numbers for Food and Drug Administration (FDA)/Bioterrorism Act (BTA) shipments has been resolved.
The Chair of the Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Related Homeland Security Functions (COAC)1 has submitted "unofficial" comments on CBP's proposed rule to amend 19 CFR to require Security Filing (SF) information from importers and additional information from carriers (10+2) for vessel (maritime) cargo before it is brought into the U.S.