Customs administrative reform: Many indicators continue to be improved

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The workshop. Photo: Huong Diu.

The workshop was chaired by Mr. Vu Ngoc Anh - the Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs, Mr. Hoang Quang Phong - the Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and Mr. Nguyen Quang Vinh - the Deputy Secretary General of the VCCI.

Enterprises’ assessment is positive

At the workshop, the Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs, Mr. Vu Ngoc Anh said that the assessment of businesses had encouraged the Customs force to continue implementing Customs administrative reform solutions. Over the past years, the Customs force has made efforts to modernize towards openness and transparency, strong application of information technology to administrative procedures, application of modern management methods; and strengthening of discipline of civil servants and Customs officers.

The Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs, Mr. Vu Ngoc Anh said: Vietnam Customs plays an important role in helping exporters and importers approach the world market with many opportunities to develop production, business and bring economic benefits for Vietnam. In order to carry out this role, the Customs force will continue to implement many solutions to improve the investment and business environment for enterprises in accordance with the spirit and requirements in Government’s Resolution 19 / NQ-CP. However, the Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs, Mr. Vu Ngoc Anh said that some Ministries were still slow in improving the business and investment environment in Government’s Resolution 19 / NQ-CP, especially the reform of specialized inspection procedures and the implementation of the National Single Window.

The survey results showed that in 2016 enterprises continued to recognize administrative procedures reform on Customs with a significant improvement compared to 2015.

For the implementation of Customs procedures, the survey in 2016 requested enterprises to assess the ease of implementation: Customs administrative procedures; specific difficulties in the implementation of Customs clearance procedures; goods verification procedures through the monitoring area; tax administration procedures; post-clearance audits procedures; and assistance in solving difficulties in the implementation of administrative procedures.

The survey results also showed that the majority of enterprises said that the implementation of administrative procedures was not too difficult. The procedures for tax payment was assessed to be the easiest procedure with the highest proportion of 29%, followed by the examination of records (accounting for 12%). However, there were some procedures assessed to be the hardest procedures as follows: procedures for the tax refund (29%), procedures for consideration of tax exemption (26%), and procedures for the settlement of complaints (21%). In some areas, the percentage of enterprises having difficulties decreased compared to 2015, including: the examination of documents, physical inspections of goods, procedures for consideration of tax exemption and procedures for the tax refund. However, the rate of enterprises having difficulties in carrying out Customs post-clearance inspections increased.

For a survey on the services of Customs officers, there were five criteria as follows: the appropriate performance of the functions and tasks; considering enterprises as cooperative partners. The survey results showed that 37% of enterprises assessed the Customs officers' compliance (civilized behavior and proper performance of duties) at a high / very high level. For the remaining criteria, the rate was about 28-30%. For job skills, the results of the survey in 2016 showed that enterprises had a more positive assessment of the skills of Customs officers compared to 2015 in the tax management procedures, post-clearance audits, administrative sanctions and complaint settlement. However, the Customs clearance procedures have not been appreciated by enterprises compared to last year's survey.

There are too many regulations on specialized inspections

In the 2016 survey, specialized inspections were new indicators. This was a problem that many businesses encountered. Accordingly, many inadequacies in specialized inspections were pointed out by enterprises in the 2016 survey. Specifically, 93% of enterprises said that the regulations on specialized inspections were too many, in many different documents, so it was difficult for enterprises to grasp information and comply with the Law. In addition, 89% of enterprises said that many regulations did not fit the reality and 82% of enterprises realized that coordination among agencies was not smooth. Notably, 81% of enterprises said that the time required for inspections was too long. 72% of enterprises said that the sharing of information among agencies was not good, so it took enterprises more time to wait. Also, 68% of enterprises said the time of inspections was extended compared to the regulations.

Although a large percentage of enterprises said that the performance of specialized inspections in these areas was normal, in terms of difficult / very difficult level, there were cultural inspections (59%), followed by the health inspections (40%) and animal quarantine (36%). In other sectors, there were over 20% of enterprises rating as difficult / very difficult, including food safety (29%) and quality control (25%).

Regarding the indicators of the implementation of the National Single Window in 2016, out of 1,035 enterprises, 35% of them said that they had implemented administrative procedures on the National Single Window. Accordingly, 35% of private enterprises, 34% of FDI enterprises and 32% of SOEs carried out the procedures through the National Single Window. Assessing the process of implementing procedures on the National Single Window, 49% of enterprises said that it was absolutely convenient. However, they said that there were certain difficulties. Only 2% of respondents said that they encountered difficulties in implementing the procedures through the National Single Window.

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In order to further reform Customs procedures, at the meeting, the delegates suggested that the Customs force, in the coming time, should further reform in a number of areas as follows: simplification of the administrative procedures; improvement of the quality of information provision; strengthening of the Customs-business partnership; and the application of IT as well as promotion of public transparency in the implementation of Customs procedures for businesses.