ARLINGTON, Va. -- A host of potential quota issues and a lack of industry testing is causing some anxiety in the trade community over the approaching July 23 deadline for filing entries and entry summaries for most remaining entry types in ACE, said industry executives speaking June 6 at the American Association of Exporters and Importers annual conference. Mirroring concerns recently voiced by CBP officials over the July 23 mandatory use date (see 1605260009), one software developer on the panel said she expects the “hard cutover” for quota to cause more problems than were seen during the recent March 31 and May 28 mandatory use dates.
The Food and Drug Administration’s PREDICT screening system is “working as intended,” resulting in higher targeting rates for unsafe food shipments in the five years since implementation, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report (here). Though some problems persist, including data collection issues, shipments with higher risk scores are being screened more often and FDA inspectors are finding more violations in connection with these shipments, according to data from the report.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
CBP will soon begin sending more rejects to filers for errors on ACE entries with National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data, CBP said in a message sent June 2 (here). Since NHTSA began its ACE pilot in August 2015, CBP had been rejecting only about one-third of entries that violated NHTSA business rules, and accepting sending warning messages for the other two-thirds of problematic NHTSA entries, CBP said. NHTSA has now requested that CBP accept and issue warnings for only one-third of entries in violation of its business rules, and reject the other two-thirds. As a result, CBP will begin sending rejects for types of errors that had previously been accepted with a warning message. “For example, vehicle identification number errors and incorrect tire or glazing numbers will continue to be warnings while entries that are missing the required HS-7 declarations will be rejected,” CBP said. The change will be deployed in the ACE certification testing environment on June 13, and the live production environment on June 25, CBP said.
CBP will begin a pilot to test filing in ACE of data required for exports of fish products regulated by the National Marine Fisheries Service, it said (here). The pilot, which will begin “after June 1,” will include fish products subject to NMFS’ Highly Migratory Species Program (tuna and swordfish) and its Antarctic Marine Living Resources Program (fresh and frozen toothfish). Filers will submit required data, such as that required under the current paper Bluefin Tuna Catch Document, Swordfish Statistical Document, Bigeye Statistical Document, and Dissostichus Catch Document, through the Automated Export System, AESDirect and the document imaging system. For approved participants, the test may include all modes of transport at the selected ports, and all commodities regulated under the two NMFS export monitoring programs when exported at one of the selected ports, CBP said. Exporters seeking to participate should contact their client representative or send an email to Steven Zaccaro at steven.j.zaccaro@cbp.dhs.gov with the subject heading “NMFS Export FRN-Request to Participate,” CBP said.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
CBP released a fact sheet on the recently increased de minimis value threshold (here). Effective since March 10 (see 1603100010), CBP increased the de minimis limit from $200 to $800. "All existing processes and restrictions for merchandise shipments remain the same" as before the value increased, CBP said. "Even in the case of low value shipment, CBP has the right to require a formal entry on any shipment where additional information, bonding, or protection is required," it said. There's been some concern as to how the de minimis increase will affect work for brokers and importers (see 1605160030).
A recent deployment of changes to ACE filing requirements for the Food and Drug Administration on May 31 went smoothly, despite some concerns leading up to the deployment among the trade community, said customs brokers and software developers. Following the relatively uneventful passage of CBP’s May 28 deadline for certain cargo release entry types, import filers and developers on May 31 again reported only minor issues, with an outage that evening unrelated to the deployment and its timing coincidental, said FDA.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters: