Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City: Acting for the business community

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Deputy Director of General Department of Vietnam customs, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong exchanged with leaders of JSC Dai Tan Viet. Photo: T.H.

From idea to action

Deputy Director General of the Department of Vietnam Customs, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong, in charge of HCM City Customs Department, said that the implementation of Resolution No. 35 / NQ-CP in 2016 and Resolution 201-2017 / NQ-CP of 2017 of the Government on continuing to implement main tasks and solutions to improve the business environment and enhance national competitiveness in 2017 and orientation to 2020, as well as Decision No. 182/QD-TCHQ dated 25 / 1/2016 of the General Department of Customs promulgated regulations on the development plan of Customs partners - business community, and leadership of the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City and raised the idea of selecting typical enterprises to support to promote the operation of enterprises and raise the unit's revenue. The leaders of the Department have assigned the Division of Export-Import Tax to coordinate with staff and branches to select 400 enterprises with large export turnover, contributing large State budget revenue, accounting for more than 70% of State budget revenue in 2016 of the Department, to have plans to support production and business activities.

According to the leaders of the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City, drawing experience from dialogue with enterprises held one or two times per year, the time is limited, the number of participants is large, so there is not much time for enterprises to outline difficulties and obstacles, as well as the time for Customs authorities to solve the problem, Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City has developed an Action Plan "Business community and Customs agencies are reliable partners and Companions to development "to have specific solutions supporting the business community.

From this specific plan, the Department will meet directly with each enterprise, leaders of Ho Chi Minh City and Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City will listen to business presentationsand export-import business plan ( Such as the total value of import-export turnover and the amount of State budget remittance in 2017) and forecast the advantages and disadvantages in 2017. On that basis, for HCM City and Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City will calculate the annual State budget revenue and other contents closely to reality; At the same time, classification of difficulties and problems of enterprises related to Customs process, related to warehousing or specialized inspection, to remove or propose solutions to the Government, Ministry of Finance, Ministries and branches to remove difficulties and create favorable conditions for production and business of enterprises.

With the spirit of all units and officers, Customs Departments must be determined to implement Government Resolution No. 19/2017 / NQ-CP into action, with a concrete plan for successful implementation of the objectives: Reducing Customs clearance time from 108 hours to 70 hours for exports, and decreasing from 138 hours to 90 hours for imports; Implement online public administrative procedure level 3 with 41 procedures. On specialized inspections, the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City strives to reduce the rate of yellow flow corresponding to the process of specialized inspection law for export-import goods from 38% to less than 20%. At the same time, reducing the export-import license; conditions for export and import in accordance with the Law of Enterprises in 2016 on the principle that enterprises are allowed to engage in import-export activities which are not prohibited by law. Since then, the goal is to raise the budget revenue, reducing container costs, and other expenses for businesses.

In addition, the Department will strengthen the work of management, anti-smuggling and trade fraud to create an environment of equal competition for enterprises. On the part of enterprises, it is also necessary to see rights and obligations in complying with Customs law and to step by step increase the compliance in areas under the management of Customs as well as providing information for the Customs authorities to ensure the building of a fair and healthy business environment.

Business community excited, agree

Over the past two weeks, besides the delegation led by Deputy Director of General Department of Vietnam Customs, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong, many delegations led by the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City came to the enterprises which had large import-export turnover and tax paid, to directly listen, solving immediately the problems of enterprises, and asked enterprises to propose solutions to facilitate further business activities of enterprises. At the beginning of the meeting, the delegation led by Deputy Director of General Department of Vietnam Customs, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong visited two companies with large tax payments which were pharmaceutical JSC II and Dai Tan Viet Joint Stock Company.

With an open attitude at the meeting, business leaders frankly talked about all the obstacles affecting the process of goods clearance of enterprises. The issues of the enterprises which related to any business or branches were settled immediately by Deputy Director, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong. At the same time, recognizing problems related to policy mechanism, involving ministries and branches to sum up reports and proposing to competent to authorities to settle.

Not only resolved immediately problems raised by the enterprises at the meeting, Deputy Director, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong also asked the leaders of enterprises to propose recommendations and solutions for Customs agencies to serve the enterprises the best way, enhancing the competitiveness of enterprises. From this point of view, leaders of enterprises have boldly put forward their recommendations and proposals for export and import activities of enterprises to be better.

Le Thi Van, General Director of Dai Tan Viet JSC, said that the imported goods of the company are mainly food, must be specialized inspected for food hygiene and safety. The big obstacle affecting the production and business activities of enterprises nowadays is the issue of specialized inspection for food commodities. Enterprises recommend that, the authorities should accept the certificates of developed countries instead of mass inspection as today, because many commodities have originated from developed countries are monitored closely from breeding to growing, planting, processing and distribution; price consultation should be checked by probability, the enterprise is responsible for the truthfulness in the Customs declaration, if the cross inspection or unexpected inspection found any violations, the enterprise will be severely punished. In addition, for the post-Customs clearance inspection, enterprises should make recommendations soon to timely correct the shortcomings, especially retrospective tax collection, should not last 5 years, very difficult for enterprises with tax arrears.

Sharing with the delegation, leaders of enterprises excitedly said, so far, the State management agencies visit many enterprises to carry out inspections, the highest delegation leaders of The Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City directly to work, share and remove difficulties for enterprises showing the closeness and sincerity of the State management agencies in the companion development with enterprises.

Although the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City informed in advance the composition, content of work, Ms Le Thi Van, general director of Dai Tan Viet Corporation was surprised and impressed with the sincere desire of the leadership of Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh city and the delegations. "I think only a few Customs officers in the department work with companies, who hesitated including leaders of the General Department of Vietnam Customs, leaders of Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City and leaders of branches and staff division to support us, so we prepared a very crowded reception, Ms Van said.

Ms Nguyen ThiThanh Phuong, Deputy General Director of Central Pharmaceutical Joint Stock Company No 2, said: "At first, we heard reports from the Customs Department of Ho Chi Minh City to work, I was a little afraid, but through the work, many questions of enterprises were thoroughly answered by the leader of the General Department of Vietnam Customs and his comrades, at the same time, recording many recommendations of enterprises in handling Customs clearance of goods. In addition, the delegation also provided enterprises with a lot of practical contents, serving the daily work of enterprises, as well as improving the credibility of enterprises, such as AEO standards; warning violations for enterprises to avoid; Program of reforming procedures, and supporting enterprises for Customs.

At the meetings with enterprises, Deputy director, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong said that the revenue of Customs of Ho Chi Minh City is very large, accounting for nearly one third of the total revenue of Vietnam Customs, Therefore, it is very important to raise income and honor the contribution of enterprises. Enterprises contribute revenue to the State budget from several hundred billion to trillion vnd per year; the salary of Customs officersreceive from the budget is also thanks to enterprises, so there is no reason for not supporting enterprises in a most devoted way. Deputy Director of General Department of Vietnam Customs also committed to enterprises, officials who cause difficulties, harassment, making the wrong process, regulations when handling goods clearance for businesses will be dealt with severely.

Ho Chi Minh City: drastically fighting against losses of revenues and transfer pricing VCN – on 19 February, 2017, the Ho Chi Minh City Municipal Party Standing Committee and Permanent ...

Thanks to the sincere support and goodwill of the Customs authorities, the leaders of the enterprises have pledged to abide by the law and do their best to contribute more to the State budget and society.