Future outbound notifications in the Automated Commercial Environment for ocean, air, rail and in-bond's may be delayed two hours “for the foreseeable future,” CBP said in an Aug. 10 CSMS message. The agency said it’s “working on a fix to speed these notifications up and another CSMS will be issued when that has been implemented.”
Automated Commercial Environment (ACE)
The Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) is the CBP's electronic system through which the international trade community reports imports and exports to and from the U.S. and the government determines admissibility.
CBP this week deployed a new export manifest-related informational response message in the Automated Commercial Environment’s (ACE) certification environment “for the Ocean House Bill Release,” CBP said in a June 6 CSMS message. New message 610 will appear with the description “Empty Vessel (Departure Message – No bill associated to that vessel),” CBP said. “A date for release to the Production environment will be sent in a future message.”
The Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee issued an update on the status of its Export Modernization Working Group as well as one draft recommendation for CBP ahead of the COAC’s June 14 meeting.
The Census Bureau deployed a new informational message in the Automated Export System Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) certification environment Jan. 10, which will be alerting exporters when the U.S. Principal Party in Interest address state field and state of origin field don’t match (see 2212220023). In a Jan. 9 CSMS message, CBP reminded industry that exporters and software developers submitting Electronic Export Information through the Electronic Data Interface will “need to program and test their software so that their clients receive the new response code message.” CBP also said the message will be active in the ACE production environment on Feb. 7.
The Government Accountability Office and the Department of Homeland Security Inspector General each released a report on Dec. 17 that noted various issues within CBP's drawback program. The GAO's report suggested that CBP work to flag excessive export submissions and “establish a reliable system of record for proof of export,” among other things. The DHS IG report found that CBP “lacked appropriate documentation retention periods to ensure importers and claimants maintained support for drawback transactions” and didn't scrutinize prior drawback claims enough for claimants during 2011 to 2018.
An Iranian businessman was sentenced to 46 months in prison for illegally exporting carbon fiber from the U.S. to Iran, the Justice Department said Nov. 14. Behzad Pourghannad worked with two others between 2008 and 2013 to export the carbon fiber to Iran from third countries using falsified documents and front companies, the agency said.
The U.S. will soon start discussions with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations about a possible connection between ASEAN's customs filing platform with the U.S. platform, the State Department said in a Nov. 3 fact sheet about "Expanding the Enduring Partnership" with ASEAN. "The United States and the ASEAN Secretariat announced the opening of negotiations to link the ASEAN 'Single Window' with the U.S. Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) System, which governs all trade in goods entering the United States," State said. "Making this link will further facilitate $272 billion in two-way trade in goods between the United States and ASEAN."
CBP would like even more public feedback on how to modernize the agency's processes and regulations, CBP said in a notice. CBP said it is reopening the comment period until April 11 to allow for new input after it held a March 1 meeting to discuss a wide range of ideas for updates. The March 1 meeting included few mentions of exports, but the docket of the original request for comments includes multiple suggestions and criticisms on the export side.