COAC Voices Concerns with Pre-Departure ACE Export Manifest Filing Test for Air Cargo

The Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations made a number of recommendations to CBP meant to resolve industry concerns with the recently announced air cargo pilot for pre-departure Automated Commercial Environment export manifest filing (see 1507090011). The manifest work group within the COAC Exports Subcommittee recommended that CBP make changes to the timelines, data elements, and procedures for managing holds within the test. CBP legal staff should also be more closely in contact with the COAC Subcommittee when developing regulatory notices, it said. The COAC approved the recommendations at the July 29 meeting in Chicago.

Pilot participants must "agree to provide export manifest data electronically at least 4 hours prior to loading of the cargo onto the aircraft in preparation for departure" from the U.S., said CBP in the pilot notice (here). The work group said in its status report (here) that the timeline in the Federal Register notice "is not achievable in the air cargo environment" and was not discussed within the COAC. There was also no mention of "progressive filing," which COAC previously suggested, it said. "Initial written commentary" from the group was already submitted to CBP, it said.

Also troubling was the addition of data elements in the test, it said. Specifically, "new export data elements not currently required on Form 7509 were introduced without advance trade discussion to determine feasibility" and "mandatory elements that are not applicable to the air environment or that cannot be provided in the allowable message formats were included." The COAC recommended that for future ACE export manifest tests, CBP make sure that the timelines and data elements are "thoroughly vetted with the trade, and that trade concerns with regard to feasibility and negative impact have been mitigated to the full extent possible."

The COAC also recommended that CBP more closely collaborate with the Exports Subcommittee as it moves toward electronic export processing. "Incremental, piecemeal approaches to the regulatory reform process and excessively long delivery timelines for" regulatory notices and proposed rulemakings "are incompatible with what must be accomplished over the next 2-4 years," it said. "To better facilitate CBP’s trade transformation strategy with regard to exports, the [Office of Regulations and Rulings] legal team should become an integral player in the substantive discussions taking place in the work groups of the COAC Export Subcommittee."

Meanwhile, the Option 4 work group, also part of the Exports Subcommittee, advised CBP to work with the Census Bureau to identify "the export data it needs for security screening and export regulatory purposes, as well as when and why they are needed." The work group is tasked with working with CBP to develop a model for continued post-departure filing of export information. CBP and Census should then "consult closely and collaboratively with Option 4 filers and their partner carriers to determine whether they can make all or part of those data elements available," the COAC recommended. "If some, or all, of the data cannot be provided in line with above, CBP should investigate alternatives." Because Option 4 is spelled out in the Census Bureau's foreign trade regulation, any changes would require changes to the regulations, said Deborah Augustin, acting executive director, ACE Business Office .