U.S. CUSTOMS? 0R&R PROMOTES ONLINE RULINGS SEARCH SYSTEM

U.S. CUSTOMSÆ 0R&R PROMOTES ONLINE RULINGS SEARCH SYSTEM    U.S. Customs’ Office of Regulations & Rulings has increased its use of information technology to improve its management of rulings for the import industry.
   In June, the agency launched the Customs Rulings Online Search System (CROSS). The system, which is accessible on the Internet at https://rulings.customs.gov, contains more than 89,000 rulings published by OR&R and the agency’s national commodity specialist divisions. “Perspective rulings are published in CROSS within 2 weeks of issuance,” Customs said.
   Prior to last year, OR&R was often criticized by importers for taking 120 days or more to issue certain types of rulings related to classification and value of merchandise.
   When Robert C. Bonner was appointed to Customs commissioner last year, he made it one of his objectives to reduce the ruling wait-time to 90 days or less and to clear out a backlog of 900 ruling requests in OR&R.
   “We did clean up the backlog and are maintaining a 90-day turnaround time on rulings,” said Michael Schmitz, assistant commissioner for OR&R.
   Schmitz said OR&R wants eventually to receive ruling requests from the import industry in electronic format. “We will work with the trade to develop these requirements,” he said.