CBP Amends Regulations to Allow Electronic Liquidation Bulletin

CBP is amending its regulations to allow for official liquidation notices to be posted electronically to the agency's website, in a final rule (here). Effective Jan. 14, notices of liquidations, reliquidations, liquidation suspensions and liquidation extensions will no longer be posted at ports, CBP said. Instead, CBP will post electronic notices of liquidation, reliquidation, suspension and extension on its website in a searchable database.

According to CBP's previously announced plans, the electronic bulletin notices will be searchable by using two or more of 10 data elements, such as filer, importer of record number, port of entry or liquidation dates. "For example, conducting a search by entering the port of entry and selecting a posted date would return results for all notices posted for that port for that date," CBP has said. Importer of record numbers will not be viewable in search results. Information on liquidations will be maintained on the CBP website for a minimum of 15 months, after which historical liquidation information may be obtained from a filer's client representative or the relevant port or Center of Excellence and Expertise, CBP said in the final rule.

CBP will post entries set for automatic liquidation on the agency's "standard 314-day cycle" on Fridays, it said. Manual liquidations, where action by CBP was required, will generally post to the website within 90 minutes of liquidation, CBP said. Though asked by industry to immediately post liquidations to its website (see 1611150012), CBP said that is not possible because it is not immediately aware when entries are deemed liquidated. However, CBP is replacing language from its proposed rule requiring posting deemed liquidations "within a reasonable period" with a requirement that it post the information when it determines an entry has deemed liquidated.

CBP will make the information available in a "conspicuous" location on its website, although not necessarily on the home page, it said. "CBP assures that the link will remain conspicuous regardless of any potential future CBP website changes," it said. CBP will also end its practice of mailing paper notices of extension or suspension, it said. However, the agency is not changing the method by which it issues electronic notices, which most importers rely on, it said.

The changes should save time for the trade, CBP said. Electronic posting will allow importers "to avoid visiting U.S. customhouses and stations for formal entry liquidation and reliquidation information, which typically occur 2,500 times a year," CBP said. "For each trip to a U.S. customhouse or station avoided, importers will save an estimated 45 minutes." They'll also save time for CBP, the agency said in its proposed rule (see 1610130018), which it adopted with only minor changes. "Physically posting the bulletin notice of liquidation, repeated at each customhouse every week, is laborious and time-consuming," it had said.

(Federal Register 12/12/16)