U.S. COURT OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE WON?T SPUR CUSTOMS ON HMT REFUNDS

U.S. COURT OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE WONÆT SPUR CUSTOMS ON HMT REFUNDS    The U.S. Court of International Trade has refused to order the U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection to speed up the processing of Harbor Maintenance Tax refund claims.
   Customs began collecting the tax in 1987 on behalf of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to help fund dredging and other infrastructure improvements. The tax, as applied to exports, was declared unconstitutional in 1998. Customs delayed processing refund claims until 2000, and did not complete its first disposition of such a claim until September 2001, Judge Jane A. Restani noted in her ruling.
   For the 7,706 claims filed, the court ordered Customs to establish a procedure to process 500 claims per month.
   A U.S. Customs official said April 4 the agency has processed about half of the claims for refunds and hopes to complete all claims by August 2004.
   In her ruling, Restani noted a statement from Customs saying “more Customs on-site employees cannot be devoted to the process without adversely affecting the vital operations at the finance center where the claims are processed.”
   Restani said plaintiffs Eastman Chemical, Chevron USA, American Synthetic Rubber and two Michelin companies, “have never made clear what else Customs should do and how it could do it faster. Thus, the court cannot conclude that Customs has refused to do its duty or violated any duty it owed plaintiffs in this regard.”
   Tom Smith, director of the National Finance Center, said Customs has 16 contractors helping eight Customs employees clear the backlog. The office now completes about 200 claims per month and hopes to soon up that figure to 300 per month, Smith said. Claims are processed in the order in which they were received up through the Dec. 31, 2001 filing deadline.
   Smith told the Treasury Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations (COAC) on April 4 that the need to validate information from some information all the way back to 1987 slows the administrative process because Customs doesn't have records prior to 1990.
   On average the turnaround time for a claim is about two years, he said.
   Carol Fuchs, an attorney with KMZ Rosenman and a member of COAC, responded at the public meeting: 'I'm tempted to ask why can't Customs refund the harbor tax within 24 hours.' The comment was in reference to a U.S. Customs requirement since Dec. 2 that ocean carriers submit manifest declarations 24 hours prior to lading.