NCBFAA Calls on CBP To Fix System Issues, Bring Back Functionalities Lost in ACS-ACE Transition

ACE filers continue to face downtime and slowdown issues worse than those encountered in the legacy Automated Commercial System, and several functionalities essential to the trade community are still unavailable, including some that were available in the legacy system before it was mostly shut down July 23, the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America said in a position paper (here). “Much remains to be done” before the implementation of ACE can be declared a success, with performance of some aspects of the new electronic filing regime still lagging behind that of the ACS, it said.

Recently published reports show ACE is only online 96% of the time, down from the 99% availability of ACS, said the position paper, which the NCBFAA said was provided to CBP and the Customs Commercial Operations Advisory Committee (COAC). That means ACE is down 60 hours per month. “Considering this is a 24/7/365 day environment, a 96% system availability rate would be unacceptable,” the NCBFAA said. That figure doesn’t include frequent system slowdowns that occur “several times each week,” it said. “Stabilizing system performance needs to be a top priority for CBP.”

“Loss of functionality from ACS to ACE is a step backwards, which the NCBFAA cannot support,” the NCBFAA said. ACE’s 8 megabyte transmission limit is also too low, and in some cases is “more restrictive than the current ACS 999 line level limitation, as the PGA records represent a very large amount of required data per line,” the position paper said. “This is in direct contradiction to the 9,999 line level limitation communicated throughout the entire development process and it forces additional software and operational changes. File size needs to be addressed and expanded to the original level of 9,999 lines in ACE,” the NCBFAA said. ACE also lacks several Automated Broker Interface (ABI) functionalities in its current form that were available in ACS, like ABI protest and the Automated Invoice Interface, the trade group said. CBP intends to deploy an ACE ABI protest module in late August, it has said (see 1607270015).

Other functionalities have been “consistently communicated as essential in the ACE support from our industry,” and “should be developed and delivered in ABI immediately” regardless of whether CBP considers them to be “core” deployments, the NCBFAA said. These include automated informal entry processes, such as Section 321 in ABI, submission of CBP Form 3311 (American goods returned) in ABI, export manifest, true monthly payment via the statement, and house-bill release. Accompanying the letter is a list of ACE functionalities deemed essential by the NCBFAA (here), including improvements to “sporadic” and “confusing messaging” and One USG messages “not functioning as intended as [an] indicator that all governing agencies have concluded their interest in holding the cargo.”

The NCBFAA called on CBP and partner government agencies (PGAs) to provide the trade community with adequate notice of data elements they will require in ACE, including the rationale for those data elements, as well as adequate opportunity for comment and testing. CBP and the PGAs should also publish “instruction manuals, “How To” guides, directions and the like,” the trade group said. “It is essential that CBP and the PGAs release written guidance for each ACE/ITDS function contemporaneously with released functionality and before mandated use. This allows users to understand, adopt and train for new functionality and provides a tool for problem-solving and support decisions,” it said.