BIS Expands Commodity Classification Process to Include DOD, Official Says

The Bureau of Industry and Security recently expanded its commodity classification request process to include the Department of Defense, which is expected to slightly increase processing times and potentially require more thorough submissions of classification requests, an agency official said. The Defense Department began participating in the process late last year as part of BIS’s implementation of the 2018 Export Control Reform Act, said John Varesi, an official in BIS’s Sensors and Aviation Division. ECRA “required that there would be an interagency effort in terms of the commodity classifications,” Varesi said during a March 2 Sensors and Instrumentation Technical Advisory Committee meeting. “This is basically the implementation of that requirement.”

While BIS had previously sent some classification requests for interagency discussion, many of those were limited to “600 series” items, Varesi said, which include military-related goods. BIS is now sharing “all of the commodity classification requests” -- applications from industry to determine whether an item falls under the Commerce Control List -- with the Defense Department.

While some internal processes have changed for BIS and Defense Department officials, Varesi expects any impact on industry to be “pretty minimal.” But Varesi stressed that applications should be “a bit more formalized at the outset,” with detailed technical specifications of the item and correct descriptive information. “It no longer will just necessarily be a conversation between two parties, because there's another agency involved,” Varesi said. “So getting the documentation a little more in order is probably the biggest impact so far.”

Complete and accurate classification requests will also help communication between BIS and the Defense Department, Varesi said, which now have to coordinate more closely. “There may be a follow-up call with a classification [request], and when it was a single agency process, we could put notes into the case file that would explain, in the context of a case file, additional information about the product,” he said. “That’s a bit more difficult to do now.” Varesi said it will “come down to really preparing a thorough submission off the bat.”

The two agencies also have a dispute resolution process, with final say belonging to Commerce, Varesi said. He added that there are no immediate plans to include other agencies, including the State Department.

While Varesi said he is unsure exactly how the interagency process has impacted processing times, he expects the process has added a “couple” more days. But he also said times can vary “significantly,” depending on the item at the center of the request. “I don't believe it's adding weeks at this point,” Varesi said. “But like I said, I don't have any firm data to back that up.”