The Recent Aes Requirements

The Recent AES Requirements

Automated Export System (AES) is the export system that used by U.S exporters and forwarders to declare the international export to the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) automatically. AES basically has been used by exporters approximately 11 years. In February 2005, U.S Census and CBP published that In the first quarter of 2006, all export shipment requiring the Shipper Export Declaration (SED) previously is mandatory to do the electronic filing through the AES or AESDirect which is the free Internet-based portal for filing export information. The U.S Census Bureau created AESDirect mainly for small and midsize exporters and forwarders while AES is to serve large exporters and forwarders. Mandatory AES allows the Customs and Border Protection to check for discrepancies and violation in export shipment easier and more accurate. Also, it is harder for exporters to conceal the violations. Generally, this requirement and regulation of AES filing is expecting to become a law.

Basically, the most significant new regulation of mandatory AES is its penalty policies. The new requirements of AES have a dramatic change of penalties when the false and delayed of AES filing occurred. The new civil penalties may be up to $1,100 per day, and $10,000 per violation which is 10 times the previous penalties. And, the criminal penalties are up to $10,000 per violation, and five years of jail time. Census to the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) and the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are the authority to take those penalties in place. Also, as the same requirement of SED filing, export to Canada and shipment value less than $2,500 are not required for AES filing due to that U.S goverment relies on Canadian import data and the Census does not have enough capability to handle and store great volume of data. However, all export that required a license from the U.S government must apply AES or AESDirect filing even the shipment value is less than $2,500. This is the result of that license is required for munitions shipment and goods which account for export controls. Another significant change is that the government's term for the beneficial owner of the cargo, U.S principle party in interest, has to file the post-departure information itself. If the cargo's owner is not certified by the government, it will need to adopt approval for pre-departure reporting, and then get permission for post-departure submissions. Before the new regulation, forwarders and exporters can help the client file the information after the shipment has left the United States. Although, the new requirement of AES is not difficult or painful for exporters and forwarders to follow; it is very important and relevant that the exporter and forwarders have to pay a lot more attention to the accuracy of filing through AES since AES has a great ability to catching errors occurred on filing information.

Along with the new regulation of mandatory AES, there are several other new rules and changes to the Foreign Trade Statistic Regulations (FTSR). First, the SED will rename to Electronic Export Information (EEI). Second, FTSR will change to Foreign Trade Regulations (FTR). Next, the term "shipment" in the FTR will not refer to the "exporter" but to U.S. Principle Party in Interest (USPPI). Last, the state of origin of a shipment means that where the merchandise started its journey.

The new regulation and changes was expected to be effective in March 2006. However, the final rule of AES has not been implemented and approved by U.S. Census and Customs and Border Protection. The delay is result from The Homeland Security (DHS) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had two major concerns and objection about mandatory AES.

First of all, DHS and CBP wants Census to either eliminate filing AES after departure or have stricter requirement for new companies and exporters to enroll the program. Also, DHS and CBP do not want to see the post-departure filers simply and easily apply into the mandatory program.

Post-departure filing along with AES is known as Option 4. Option 4 allows the exporters and forwarders to declare the export 10 days after the departure of the shipment was made. There were approximately about 2,300 exporters allowed to continue the Option 4 filing along with AES. However,