TIR Carnet Rule Amended for Goods Carried by Road; Effective Jan 1

The UN Economic Council for Europe announced that amendments to the Customs Convention on the International Transport of Goods under cover of TIR carnets (TIR Convention) have gone into force effective January 1, 2012. The amendments¹, among other things, (i) explicitly require that issuers of TIR carnets annually notify the TIR Executive Board of the price of each type of TIR Carnet issued, (ii) set the effective date for revocation of authority to issue TIR carnets by Contracting Parties (member countries) at 3 months after the date of revocation, and (iii) make other changes.

(The TIR Convention permits the international carriage of goods by road from one customs office of departure in one country to a customs office of arrival in another country, through as many countries as necessary, without any intermediate frontier check of the goods carried. As such, the TIR procedure functions as an international customs transit system. There are currently 68 Contracting Parties, including the United States (however, according to U.S. Customs & Border Protection, TIR carnets cannot be used in the United States because there are no approved guaranteeing associations.)

ATA Carnets, on the other hand, are used for temporary importation, transit, and temporary admission of goods designed for specific purposes, duty-free and tax-free (such as professional equipment for presentations or trade fairs, for example.) ATA carnets are in use by the U.S., as well as 70 other countries and territories.)

¹Adopted by the Administrative Committee for the TIR Convention on February 3, 2011.