FDA will on Sept. 1 cease sending electronic messages on entries filed in the legacy Automated Commercial System, CBP said in a CSMS message. “After September 1, 2017, any status changes for FDA ACS entries/lines will be solely communicated via official Notices of FDA Action or other written communication from the FDA Import Division responsible. Electronic messaging will continue for entries submitted to FDA through ACE,” it said.

CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:​

The Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee approved recommendations on filing of Fish and Wildlife Service-regulated commodities in ACE, including on the agency’s upcoming pilot and a desired trusted trader program, at its Aug. 23 meeting in San Diego. The recommendations, which include short-term advice for the FWS ACE pilot as well as long-term guidance on FWS filing in general, were put forth by a COAC FWS working group created after the agency suspended its ACE pilot in January in response to industry concerns (see 1701190011). FWS has said it will take the recommendations into account when it updates its ACE implementation guide in October (see 1708160036).

Among the express industry’s hopes for CBP regulatory reforms is elimination of rules governing importer storage of records of a non-original format, and switching from a district permit structure to a “customs territory permit structure,” according to a list of recommendations provided by the Express Association of America to Tim Skud, Treasury Department deputy assistant secretary for tax, trade. Skud mentioned the recommendations at the Aug. 23 meeting of the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee, and said the EAA's were the only ones he had received so far. CBP is in the process of compiling an "inventory" of deregulatory actions to comply with Trump administration initiatives including the two-for-one rule, officials have said (see 1705090020).

The unplanned ACE outages during the week of July 31 (see 1708030015) were the result of "hardware failure," CBP Acting Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said during the Aug. 23 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee meeting in San Diego. McAleenan noted that the issues weren't caused by a cybersecurity problem or any other malicious incident.

CBP posted on the agency's website some details about the coming deployments of new ACE capabilities scheduled for Sept. 16. The agency will deploy "Non-ABI Entry Summary/Lineless (for CBP only), Duty Deferral, e214, Manufacturer ID Creation and Importer Security Filing (ISF)," it said. After the deployment, "these capabilities will no longer be filed/processed in the Automated Commercial System (ACS) and must be done via ACE," it said. CBP also said in a CSMS message that the deployment of statements in ACE, planned for Dec. 16, would now take place on Dec. 9. That change is meant to "better align with the Periodic Monthly Statement schedule" and doesn't impact the schedule for any other deployments, said CBP.

CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:​

International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Aug. 14-18 in case they were missed.

CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:​

CBP posted draft recommendations from the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) e-commerce working group on Section 321 entries ahead of the COAC meeting on Aug. 23 in San Diego. The recommendations "are intended to improve the import process from a facilitation and enforcement perspective for section 321-eligible shipments across all modes of transportation," the working group said. CBP issued an interim final rule on the de minimis level last year and raised a number of questions on the role of other agencies' requirements for such shipments (see 1608250029).