The Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) for CBP will next meet on Feb. 11 in San Francisco, CBP said in a notice (here). Recommendations for CBP on regulating customs brokers' collection of importer bona fides information are among the agenda items planned for the meeting. A COAC group previously put off making recommendations on the subject while the agency developed a proposal on a new Form 5106 (see 13111801). CBP proposed revisions to the form in October (see 14100815).
CBP approved OHL's request for Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) participation, the company said in a press release (here). The validation comes after the company submitted a security plan in 2013, it said. The company said the validation process was rigorous and included the vetting of OHL customers and vendors.
CBP is actively discussing how to harmonize its Trusted Trader program with similar program in Canada and Mexico, said Maria Luisa Boyce, senior trade advisor at CBP, during a Dec. 4 webinar hosted by Integration Point. "We are in conversations with Canada and Mexico on how we align our programs," she said. CBP is testing a new Trusted Trader program that combines the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism supply chain security program with the Importer Self Assessment (ISA) import compliance program (see 14101019).
Commissioner Joseph Mohorovic vowed to find funding for the product safety component of the Trusted Trader program, at a Dec. 3 hearing on the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s fiscal year 2015 operating plan. The current draft of the operating plan (here) allocates no money for development the program, despite the need for further incentives to remedy a lack of participation from industry, according to agency officials. The commission is scheduled to vote on whether to adopt the plan on Dec. 12.
The U.S. and Singapore intend to increase cooperation on customs issues though two newly signed agreements, said CBP in a Dec. 1 press release (here). CBP Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske signed a Mutual Recognition Arrangement with Singapore, allowing CBP to consider involvement in Singapore's Customs' Secure Trade Partnership as similar to participating in the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism program. Kerlikowske also signed a U.S.-Singapore Customs Mutual Assistance Recognition Arrangement (CMAA), said CBP. The Singapore CMAA, one of 72 CBP has with various countries, provides "legal framework for the exchange of information and evidence to assist countries in the enforcement of Customs laws, including duty evasion, trafficking, proliferation, money laundering, and terrorism-related activities," said CBP.
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CBP's Port of Seattle office provided additional guidance for industry on how to deal with port disruptions related to labor contract disputes on the West Coast. The Nov. 19 trade information notice largely reflects the updates from a July CSMS message (here). CBP updated a June 24 guidance (see 14062423) to include more details on how to handle shipments of FDA-regulated products. It also gives information for customs brokers whose shipments have been diverted to another district where the broker is unpermitted, updates procedures for cargo diverted to another West Coast port, and says part of CBP’s plan is to “provide front-of-the-line benefits and priority processing to partners in the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) program.”
CBP posted a user manual for the coming Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism Portal 2.0 (here). CBP plans to launch the first phase of Portal 2.0 on Dec. 8 (see 1411170024). The first phase will include a new interface for the portal, it said. "A main tenet of Portal 2.0 is to facilitate more effective account management through combining multiple Trade Accounts into a single Trade Organization," said CBP in the manual. As part of the second phase, "it will also be possible to merge multiple C-TPAT accounts into a single Security Model, if accounts are managed under the same trade account and follow the same security policies and procedures."
The first phase of the new Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism portal, called Portal 2.0, will launch on Dec. 8, the agency told C-TPAT members, according to customs consulting company Trade Innovations (here). Portal 2.0 is different enough from the previous version that it may require some training, said CBP. The portal will also require new passwords, though no other data is at risk, the agency said. CBP has said it plans to begin the new C-TPAT Exporter Entity after the first phase of Portal 2.0 is completed, though specific timing remains unclear (see 1411060012).
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