Court rejects LYAN Vietnam Co., Ltd.'s lawsuit claim against Hai Phong Customs

	Customs promotes import and export through Hai Phong international container port
	Hai Phong Customs records US$100 billion in trade
	Trade in goods at Hai Phong Customs Department reaches US$103 billion

Illustration. Source: Internet.

According to the case file, on December 21, 2020, Hai Phong Customs Department issued Decision No. 2326/QD-HQHP on post-clearance inspection at the Customs office for import declarations of imported car tires of LYAN Vietnam Co., Ltd. within five years to the time of inspection.

Through the results of the post-customs clearance inspection (for 14 declarations during the inspection period), the Post-Clearance Inspection Sub-Department (Hai Phong Customs Department) determined the commodity code of the automobile tires that the company imported is 4011.20.10.

It must apply the preferential import tax rate of 25% (goods that don’t have the code 4011.90.10, have the special preferential import tax rate ACFTA 0% as the enterprise declares during the process of import procedures).

From the inspection results and according to the provisions of the law, Hai Phong Customs imposed tax and administrative penalties on LYAN Vietnam Co., Ltd. with a total amount of more than 5 billion VND.

The basis for Hai Phong Customs to reject the code declared by the enterprise and re-determine the goods code is as follows: The company provides technical documents of the tire manufacturer branded Roadshine, Gold partner, Yingba, Superhawk imported by the Company. All shown are truck and bus tires. In the inspection records No. 638/BB-HC dated December 29, 2020, No. 642/BB-HC dated December 30, 2020, the company also confirmed imported tires with sizes 11.00R20, 11R22.5, 12.00 R20; 12R22.5; 295R22.5, the number of thin layers from 18-20PR is suitable for many types of transport such as buses, cargo trucks, tractors, trailers, and semi-trailers.

Pursuant to Article 18 of Decree No. 08/2015/ND-CP dated January 21, 2015; Circular No. 14/2015/TT-BTC dated January 30, 2015 of the Ministry of Finance guiding the classification of goods, analysis for classification of goods, analysis for quality inspection and food safety inspection; Circular No. 17/2021/TT-BTC dated February 26, 2021 of the Minister of Finance amending and supplementing a number of articles of Circular No. 14/2015/TT-BT, customs authorities determined imported goods of the Company with code 4011.20.10 are subject to the preferential import tax rate of 25% as mentioned above.

Regarding the notification of results of post-customs clearance inspection and tax imposition, according to the Circular No. 38/2015/TT-BTC dated March 25, 2015 of the Minister of Finance, which is amended and supplemented in Circular No. 39/2018/TT-BTC dated April 20, 2018 of the Minister of Finance, Decision No. 575/QD-TCHQ dated March 21, 2019 of the General Department of Vietnam Customs promulgating the process of post-clearance inspection, Hai Phong Customs Department issued Notice of inspection results No. 474/TB-HQHP dated January 14, 2021 and Notice of additional inspection results No. 9781/TB-HQHP dated October 7, 2021 in accordance with regulations.

Due to the company's incorrect declaration of import code and tax rate, leading to a lack of payable tax, on October 7, 2021, the Department issued a tax imposition decision No. 1675/QD-HQHP with 14 import declarations of the Company valued more than 2.56 billion VND (2,560,862,684 VND).

Regarding sanctioning of administrative violations, based on the Notice of inspection results No. 474/TB-HQHP and Notice of additional inspection results No. 9781/TB-HQHP, Decision on tax imposition No. 1675/QD-HQHP, Administrative violation record No. 79/BB-VPHC was made on November 1, 2021; Pursuant to Point c, Clause 1, Article 13 of Decree No. 127/2013/ND-CP as amended and supplemented in Clause 10, Article 1 of Decree No. 45/2016/ND-CP and Point a, Clause 3, Article 19 of Decree No. 119 /2017/ND-CP, on November 5, 2021, the Director of Hai Phong Customs Department issued the Decision on sanctioning administrative violations No. 1883/QD-XPVPHC against the Company for the act of “wrongly declaring the type, code and tax rate of imported goods that the customs authority discovered during post-clearance inspection but the violating organization did not voluntarily pay the payable tax amount as prescribed before the time of making the violation record; failing to declare conformity and goods subject to the regulation of conformity announcement”, the total fine was more than 2.59 billion VND (2,590,862,684 VND).

In the process of settling complaints, Hai Phong Customs confirmed that tax imposition and administrative penalties were implemented in accordance with regulations.

Disagreeing with the decision on tax imposition, administrative sanctions and complaint settlement decision of the Customs, LYAN Vietnam Co., Ltd. has filed a lawsuit to the People's Court of Hai Phong City, requesting the Court to cancel these decisions, simultaneously requesting Hai Phong Customs to compensate for the damage of VND 478 million.

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At the first-instance court on October 31, 2022, based on the documents and evidence collected by the Court in the case file, publicly verified at the court, based on the results of the litigation at the court, on the basis of fully and comprehensively considering the evidence, opinions of the involved parties, and opinions of the Procurator, the Trial Panel considers that the decisions on tax imposition, sanctioning of administrative violations and the complaint settlement decision of Hai Phong Customs Department were implemented in line with regulations. Therefore, the Trial Panel rejected the entire lawsuit claims of LYAN Vietnam Co., Ltd.