ACE Cargo Release Submission Rate Increasing Slowly

The submission rate for cargo release continues to edge up, with some 11.6 percent of cargo release entries in the Automated Commercial Environment as of November, according to CBP's presentation that was part of an webinar hosted by Integration Point on Dec. 15 (here). CBP reported a 10.2 percent submission rate in October. The low levels of cargo release submissions is a source of some concern at CBP ahead of the ACE transition dates (see 1510190017 and 1511050059).

In addition to the work on ACE, a North American competitiveness strategy will be a major focus for coming years, said Maria Luisa Boyce, CBP’s senior advisor for trade engagement, during the webinar. A new CBP Commercial Operations Advisory Committee working group will work toward developing a cohesive approach to customs and will "map out" the communications process between industry and U.S., Mexico and Canada customs, she said. That will allow CBP to use a "flow chart" during discussions between the countries on how the "single windows will communicate with each other," she said.

CBP also provided an update on Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) statistics, as of Dec. 1. There's already 487 exporters within C-TPAT, which was only recently opened up to exporters (see 1506020012), said CBP. The agency completed 2,539 total validations, including 470 initial validations and 2,539 revalidations in 2015. There have also been a total of 2,127 suspensions and 1,493 C-TPAT removals.

As the Centers of Excellence and Expertise continue to expand, the port personnel "are going to be aligned with certain centers," said Susan Thomas, acting director, trade operations division, Office of Field Operations. The personnel won't physically move and are "strategically placed based on the trade that comes through that point, the location of the importers, because there's still a nexus to the physical cargo," she said. Eventually, all post-release processing will be handled by one of the 10 CEEs, the rest of which are scheduled for industry-wide expansion in by June of 2016 (see 1511090014).

By focusing specific industries, the CEEs will also help CBP to modernize various rules, said Thomas. For example, the rules for petroleum and natural gas imports are somewhat outdated, she said. "That Center has been really working with the industry" to consider the differences between it and other importers, said Thomas. "We are working very closely with that industry to say 'How do we need to realign our regulations, our policies, our statues?'" because "they've identified the uniqueness in that industry," she said. Thomas also mentioned an ongoing personnel issue related to the use of pre-classification within the Apparel, Footwear & Textiles CEE (see 14031322). "There is some personnel impact I really can't get into on this call," she said. Operations of that CEE were recently expanded to take post-release trade processing for the entire industry (see 1512160018).

Email ITTNews@warren-news.com for a copy of the presentation.