PH forwarders need pre-approval for e-CCM submission beyond BOC office hours

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ID-100145696Philippine freight forwarders must file a request with the appropriate port deputy collector for operations when they submit electronic consolidated cargo manifests (e-CCM) past the work hours of the Bureau of Customs, according to BOC Assessment and Operations Coordinating Group deputy commissioner Atty. Agaton Teodoro Uvero.

This must be done so the BOC will allow, without penalty, the filing of the e-CCM within the first two hours of the next working day, Uvero clarified during a recent forum on Revised Rules for Sea Manifest Submission.

BOC is open only from 8am to 5pm, Monday to Friday.

Under Section 3.4 of Customs Memorandum Order (CMO) No. 19-2015, or the Revised Procedures for the Mandatory Submission of Electronic Sea Manifest in the electronic-to-mobile (e2m) system, “in case the cut-off time for the submission of the e-CCM is outside of government regular working hours, the e-CCM shall be submitted after arrival of the carrying vessel but within the first 2 hours (before 1000 hours) of the immediately following day.”

READ: BOC slashes penalties for late submission of sea manifests

Under the same CMO, the regular cut-off time for e-CCM submission is six hours before arrival of vessel. Late submission of e-CCM will incur a penalty of P1,000 per e-CCM.

The cut-off for submission of shipping lines’ electronic inward foreign manifest (e-IFM), on the other hand, is 12 hours before vessel arrival. Late e-IFM submission will come with a P10,000 penalty per e-IFM.

The e-IFM must be submitted before the e-CCM.

Uvero said BOC is meantime working on a memorandum that will simplify procedures for amending the manifest. Right now any material amendments must be filed with the BOC’s Law Division. The plan is to have the appropriate port deputy collector for operations look in on the amendment which, to begin with, the BOC does not view as a criminal or administrative case and therefore does not have to go through the Law Division, Uvero said.

Under CMO No. 19-2015, amendments or revisions considered as immaterial like lack of punctuation marks, spacing mistakes, wrong spelling, and other clerical errors will be done administratively and on-line.

Amendments considered as material and must be requested under oath include a change in the consignee’s name, addresses, description of goods, weight, volume, and similar changes that are considered not clerical.

Uvero said Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina is also determined to require the value of goods on the manifest. But he noted the opposition of foreign shipping lines, who said they are not privy to sale transactions and often have no access to such information.

BOC is likewise keen on reducing the shipment processing time to four hours. The Customs official said this is already being carried out at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport and they want to do the same with sea freight, mostly by eliminating some steps.

“We’re looking at dissolving certain offices, removing certain tables” to reach the four-hour processing target, said Uvero. – Roumina Pablo

Image courtesy of pakorn at FreeDigitalPhotos.net