Quicker rulings mulled as part of CTPAT

The revamped Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism will adopt several changes as its rollout ramps up in FY 2019.    U.S. Customs and Border Protection is considering development of an indicator for trusted members of the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (CTPAT) for expedited customs rulings and to submit confidential manifest requests in the CTPAT portal, CBP CTPAT Director Elizabeth Schmelzinger said last Wednesday during the CBP 2018 Trade Symposium in Atlanta.
   A 20-day turnaround for rulings would be “the perfect goal,” she said. “But if any of you have submitted a ruling, you understand that really depends upon the complexity of the ruling. … There’s all sorts of issues that can slow that up. But there’s a sincere commitment from the agency to recognize our trusted partners in a way that’s meaningful.”
   In addition to expedited rulings, CBP wants to provide trusted CTPAT members with an opportunity to submit confidential manifest requests in the CTPAT online portal, which would mean that such requests “would live in the portal” and members won’t have to “retype that request every two years,” Schmelzinger said.
   Another benefit that CBP has developed is CTPAT Defender, which Schmelzinger described as “like LifeLock for your [importer of record] IOR number.”
   She added. “Basically what we do is monitor the activity, and when something doesn’t seem right, we’ll send you an email. You can answer ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ There’ll be some information in there about the shipment. If it’s not your shipment, it doesn’t automatically mean that the shipment’s going to get offloaded, but it does mean that we’ll probably ask you a few more questions to verify that or to make sure that it is a solid ‘no.’”
   Tests of CTPAT Defender in CBP’s Trusted Trader pilot have gone well, Schmelzinger said.
   “That would be a benefit that we would kind of incrementally roll out,” she said. “I can’t imagine what the impact will be on … importers, but I think this is a step forward in the right direction. It’s an acknowledgement from CBP that we want to take care of you as you take care of us, and we’re trying to do that.”
   CBP still has “some work to do” on developing the CTPAT portal and wants to test it with Trusted Trader pilot participants, Schmelzinger said.
   Starting next fiscal year, CBP hopes to start integrating importer self-assessment (ISA) participants into the revamped CTPAT by giving them a time frame — perhaps 30 to 60 days — within the date of anniversary of their annual notification letter (ANL) submissions to put their information into the CTPAT online portal, she said.
   ISA participants submit ANLs to CBP to certify that they continue to meet ISA Program requirements.
   “The magic really has to happen when your information is in the portal, then we can begin to engage in an electronic environment,” Schmelzinger said. “I don’t want you to reapply, but you certainly have to get all those lovely documents that were in [cardboard boxes] in there. So we think we’re going to do that incrementally, and over the course of the year we should get caught up with all of our existing ISA members.”
   The industry-facing part of the portal will provide new applicants the opportunity to apply and go through the application process, she said.
   CBP is adding new cybersecurity and agricultural security minimum security criteria (MSC) as part of its CTPAT revamp, Schmelzinger said.
   Speaking during the same conference panel, Michael White, president of Cargo Network Services (CNS) Corporation, which develops and distributes services to air cargo providers, said implementation of the cybersecurity aspect of CTPAT is “really important” for CNS companies.
   “We actually look at that quite a bit through our own cyber training and security for our carrier members,” he said. “On the ground and taking care of the data and making sure our systems are working and we don’t have failures, it becomes more and more important as we do rely on electronic data.”
   Schmelzinger said agricultural security criteria is probably the most controversial MSC being implemented, yet noted the significant monetary and time costs of shipments being held up because of agricultural issues.
   “While, of course, it is true to say a slug is not a terrorist, that is a very narrow-minded way of looking at this problem set,” she added. “Agriculture issues can disrupt your supply chain significantly. In addition, they can cause damage, unintended, and the reality of including this as part of our criteria is really a few very simple steps to help prevent a very expensive occurrence on your behalf.”
   As for foreign trusted trader-type programs for exports, Schmelzinger acknowledged that there is a disconnect between U.S. exporters and foreign customs authorities in that U.S. companies often hit a wall in trying to reap benefits in other countries because governments with which the U.S. has entered into customs mutual recognition agreements often won’t accept the firms’ assigned CTPAT numbers.
But within the next few years, CBP plans to create an export “entity type” that will at least allow exporters to reap benefits under CTPAT, she said.
   “That is on the horizon and definitely [there’s] work to be done, but we do foresee that,” Schmelzinger said. “It was an intentional thought in our minds.”