Obama signs Customs authorization bill

The Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act, the first reauthorization of Customs and Border Protection since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003, streamlines or makes permanent many CBP trade programs.    Business groups rejoiced after President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act into law, marking the first authorization of Customs and Border Protection since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003.
   The legislation modernizes CBP programs and institutionalizes others the agency has launched on its own in recent years.
   Highlights of interest to the trade community include strengthened revenue collection and trade enforcement activities, such as those related to Intellectual Property Rights violations and anti-dumping countervailing duty enforcement; formal establishment of the Centers of Excellence and Expertise, which are control towers for more efficiently processing entry summaries by industry category; raising the de minimis level; reform of the complex duty drawback refund process by 2018; and authorization of continued funding for the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE), the new IT platform for import and export transactions.
   Shipments with values under the de minimis level receive simplified and expedited clearance at the border, are free of duties and taxes and require no paperwork beyond the airway bill. The law raises the filing threshold for shipments to $800 from $200, providing the same border clearance privileges for low value cargo shipments that are enjoyed by products U.S. travelers bring back from foreign trips.
   The Express Association of America, representing large global couriers, said the higher de minimis level will reduce logistics costs for small and medium-size companies that import low value components for their assembly operations, as well as for individual consumers who import single items that will not require a more formal entry process.
   Importers, logistics providers and consumers will also be spared countless hours filing paperwork to clear their goods. The EAA said the rule change will also help increase exports because small firms often are reluctant to export due to the potential costs of the border clearance process if the goods are returned.
   It also praised language in the bill calling on the U.S. Trade Representative to encourage trading partners to similarly exempt low value shipments from duties, taxes and certain customs documentation.
   The Centers of Excellence and Expertise are an example of good governance and innovation, Ben Bidwell, director of global forwarding at C.H. Robinson said in a company blog.
   “By centralizing industry clusters and allowing expertise to concentrate, the consistency of the customer experience – in this case classification and entry issue resolution – will only improve,” he wrote. “Kudos to Congress for recognizing that this program works and making it permanent.”
   The anti-dumping changes also provide some relief for importers in the form of a 375-day cap for complaints to be filed, a response to complaints about retrospective anti-dumping duties being assessed two years or more after a product has been imported.
   Another provision of the TFTEA will enable CBP to more rigorously enforce a longstanding ban on importing goods produced by child or slave labor. The law closes a loophole that allowed such products to be admitted into the United States if there was not enough supply to meet domestic demand.
   Human rights groups plan to soon file complaints showing that certain imports are made with forced labor, which will trigger CBP investigations, according to the Associated Press.