Time has certainly flown since I last posted about the first Goods Compliance Update for 2017 and here we are looking at the second Update from Australian Border Force (ABF) for the year. Here is a brief summary of the relevant points importers and exporters should be aware of:

Anti-Dumping

Assisted self-regulation is a feature of the recently published ABF Approach to Trade and Goods Compliance, and accordingly, they have included some detailed and important information for industry to review in response to a recent increase in compliance issues relating to Anti-Dumping. Interested parties are encouraged to review their tariff classifications and anti-dumping/countervailing duties which may apply, as well as the exemption or not from dumping duties which may or may not apply under a claimed Tariff Concession Order or country exemption.

Asbestos

ABF’s operational focus on detecting strictly prohibited imports of goods containing asbestos focuses on a significant contributor to detections in recent months - importations of motor vehicles and vehicle parts. If you import or intend to import a vehicle or vehicle parts, you will need to prove that they do not contain any level of asbestos. The update provides guidance to concerned parties on how they can test samples or goods to avoid delays and additional costs, and restates the significant penalties which apply to importations of any goods found to contain asbestos.

Details on other current issues are provided by ABF including: unacceptable Certificates of Origin in relation to claims of preference under the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement; points of specificity in the ingredients of importations of cider with large duty and tax ramifications; and ABF monitoring of importers’ reference to administrative rulings and the provision of rulings to new Customs Brokers.

Results were also published from the ABF Compliance Monitoring Programme for FY2016/17 to end May, including penalties issued under the Infringement Notice Scheme for the period. The figures again show another marked increase in the number of lines checked and errors identified for both imports and exports. The value of revenue understatements identified through Post-Transaction Verification and Pre-Clearance Intervention checks, of which ABF have undertaken well over 500,000 during this financial year alone, has almost quadrupled in the last three months. This is of little surprise however as valuation related errors such as valuation date, price, overseas freight and insurance, invoice terms and transactions between related parties continue to feature in the top 10 import declaration errors. The number of notices issued and value of fines for false or misleading statements, whether or not resulting in a loss of duty, also increased during the period, as did the value of revenue under-declarations brought to the attention of ABF through voluntary disclosures.

…So what was meant to be a brief overview has yet again turned into a bit of a read, however I do encourage a read of the Goods Compliance for June 2017 and consider if any of the information applies to your supply chain. As always, Tradewin are experts in trade and customs compliance, contact us if you would like to know more, and let us handle the details.