Running the agency gauntlet

Running the agency gauntlet    Importers frequently complain about U.S. Customs decisions that hold up their cargo at air, land and sea ports. But what really irks many of them is the inability to get their goods even if Customs, the agency that they deal with most frequently, admits them into the nation's commerce.
   That's because Customs has to answer to other agencies that control policies related to food, medical devices, vehicles and other products. When they want to stop and examine cargo for a possible violation, it sits.
   Customs is supposed to make a determination about whether to seize or release cargo within 35 days. But when an entry has to go through layers of bureaucracy in other agencies to be reviewed it can take more than 60 days for a decision to be rendered, according to Peter Quinter, a trade attorney with Becker & Poliakoff.
   A case study of how not to manage the border was described by Susie Hoeger, director of global trade compliance and policy for Abbott Laboratories, at Customs and Border Protection's Trade Symposium in mid-April.
   'The thing we struggle with is that CBP has these greater partnership programs, there's C-TPAT (Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism), there's ISA (Importer Self-Assessment). They give you different benefits depending on the level you achieve. But we still get the other government agencies,' she said during a panel discussion.
   The Abbott example involved a shipment of genetically modified, live albino mice brought into the country for behavioral research to help develop a clinical drug.
   The mice cost about $10 apiece and there are nine of them in a small crate.
   Here's where the story gets a little complicated.
   The Food and Drug Administration considers mice pet food because they can be fed to snakes. Under the Bioterrorism Act, companies must provide prior notice before food (including pet food) is imported so that shipments can be analyzed for potential problems.
   The tariff code for mice on the entry also triggers interest from the U.S.
Department of Agriculture, which requires several extra documents related to the end use of the mice and how they will be kept from escaping into the environment.
   The mice are shipped at a cold temperature to maintain a sleep-induced state so they don't have to eat or make waste.
   FDA personnel, concerned about the long state of confinement, decided to feed and warm up the mice, triggering their bodily processes.
   After several days, the Fish and Wildlife Service also began to check on whether the shipment involved an endangered species.
   'They were so traumatized. They had been fed non-controlled food. They had been living in their own filth in their little crate. We had to quarantine these things for about six months.
   'So the fact that all these agencies were so interested in a $90 shipment of these mice was ridiculous,' Hoeger said.
   'What we're looking for is something that's truly a multiagency immediate pre-clearance. They reserve the right to come back and audit you but your individual transactions won't get held up.
   'That's the highest level of trusted trader ' that's nirvana,' she said.