Learning how to take full advantage of CBP’s ACE reports is a process. To this end, CBP has produced a series of educational videos dedicated to running, modifying, and saving ACE Reports.

I have watched them, and I believe that they would be useful for any ACE user, from the novice to the expert, and everyone in between.

It is not a huge investment in time, as the eleven videos range from one to six minutes each, and although I was already familiar with many features and concepts, these videos deepened my understanding of the application.

I recommend watching the videos sequentially from the beginning. Each video builds upon the previous one. I also found it useful to have a session of ACE open as you work through the videos, so that you can pause the video and apply what you have just learned. I enjoyed how there are a series of short videos instead of a single long video – this makes it easy to go back to review a particular section.  

The videos are broken into three groupings.

The first grouping contains videos that focus on the fundamental matters of setting defaults, accessing the reports, and generally navigating the site.

The next grouping focuses on running, saving, modifying, and exporting reports. I know that many of you already use the canned reports, but there are tidbits in the videos that could expand your understanding of this topic.

The videos take things up a notch by explaining how to modify existing reports - it has been my experience that the pre-set reports don’t necessarily have all of the data elements that importers or exporters need, so the ability to modify reports is a powerful skill.

The last two videos tie everything together. The first explains how to create ad hoc reports from scratch and the other shows how to schedule recurring reports.

All of these videos are found on the ACE Training and Reference Guides page of CBP’s website and in the ACE Portal under ACE Reports Training Resources.

For hands-on training and practice, consider attending a Tradewin ACE Workshop, currently being presented at a variety of locations.