New points on Customs procedures in the Circular amending Circular No. 38/2015 / TT-BTC

	Decree No. 59/2018 / ND-CP: New points on Customs declaration and inspection
	Decree No. 59/2018 / ND-CP: Amendments to procedures for temporary imported goods for re-exports
	Circular No. 38/2015/TT-BTC: 68 provisions will be amended, supplemented or repealed

Many new provisions on Customs procedures create transparency in Customs management and declaration. Photo: H.Van. .

Specifying documents required in Customs dossier

In the new circular, one of the important amendments is the provision on Customs dossier. Currently, the Customs dossier is prescribed in many articles in Circular No. 38/2015 / TT-BTC (Article 16, Article 82, Article 86, Article 87, Article 93, Article 142 and Article 143), which is not specified in quantity of documents required to be submitted at the Customs clearance time, at the post-customs clearance audit time and not specified in types of documents kept by enterprises to prove that the Customs declaration has been made. Therefore, many companies and Customs officers have been very confused in determining which documents are required to be submitted during the Customs procedures, which documents must be kept at the enterprise and if the documents have been submitted to the Customs, whether they are required to be saved at the enterprises or not? And whether the saved documents must be paper documents or not?

Therefore, in the new Circular, the Customs dossier has been specified and replaced Article 16 - Customs dossier into Article 16 and Article 16a. Article 16 provides for the Customs dossier when carrying out Customs procedures, on the principle that the documents required to be submitted while carrying out Customs procedures are necessary documents in Customs management. Article 16a prescribes the saving of Customs dossier for import and export goods. Accordingly, this article lists all documents that the Customs declarant must keep and submit to the Customs upon post clearance audit or specialized inspection. The customs declarant shall be responsible for keeping all the documents referred to in Article 16a and presenting them to the Customs upon the post-Customs clearance audit or specialized inspection.

In addition, the new Circular also has big changes on export Customs dossier when carrying out Customs procedures, which supplements commercial invoices in the case where the buyer must pay the seller; prescribes the technical norms for the case of export of processed products, code of processed products and code of export manufactured products for the first time except authorized economic enterprises or enterprises connected with the Customs; details the list of forest products for export timber material. At the same time, the Circular includes provisions of the specialized management agencies to ensure transparency, such as documents certifying that enterprises are eligible for export under the law on investment and certificate of specialized inspections.

To be allowed to submit the documents in electronic form

Regarding the Customs dossier submission in electronic form, the current provision permits Customs declarants to submit paper dossier or electronic dossier. However, in reality, Customs at border gates still request enterprises must submit both paper dossier and electronic dossier. This is time-consuming and raises costs for enterprises and does not ensure the administrative reform in electronic method and does not limit the contact between enterprises and Customs. In addition, the electronic data processing system does not have the basis for automatically analysing information on Customs declaration to assist Customs officers in checking Customs dossier and identifying key points in post-clearance audit.

The Circular amending and supplementing Circular No. 38/2015 / TT-BTC specifies the submission of dossiers in electronic form ( (except for some documents required to be submitted in, such as C / O, permits ...). These documents may be in electronic data or paper documents are converted into electronic documents (scanned documents with digital signature). The Circular provides that the time of submitting the electronic dossier is the same time of registering Customs declaration.

In terms of customs declaration, the new Circular provides that import goods with one bill of lading must be declared on one import Customs declaration. In cases where one bill of lading is declared for many Customs declarations or goods without no bill of lading, the Customs declarant shall separate the bill of lading for declaration. The separation of bill of lading is carried out on the system and completely determined and ensured by the separator, the Customs authorities do not approve.

For import goods, the Customs declarant shall take the unique consignment reference number on the e-Customs data processing system to declare the number of the bill of lading. The system will issue the number automatically and the customs authorities do not approve.

In addition, the Circular also specifies the time of submitting the permits when carrying out Customs procedures. Imported or exported goods subject to permits issued by specialized management agencies must have permits before registering Customs declaration. Information on the permits must be filled out on the Customs declaration under guidance in the form 01, form 02 of Appendix II issued together with this Circular.

The declaration of information of goods in the same export container of the same owner; and Customs declaration in case of system problems are also guided in detail in the Circular.

The specialized inspection permit is required to be submitted before registering Customs declaration

Regarding the new provisions in the Circular, at the recent training conference to introduce the Circular held by the General Department of Customs, many questions from enterprises were discussed and answered specifically by the Drafting Committee.

For example, in terms of the separation of bill of lading, a company asked a question that if one bill of lading is declared for two Customs declarations, what does the company have to do to get a new bill number, and what does the company do for a shipment in which a bill of lading cannot be separated?

In response to this question, the representative from the Customs Supervision and Management Department said that the appendix of the Circular amending and supplementing Circular 38/2015 / TT-BTC, details each declaration criterion, guides the methods of separation of bill including mechanical and theoretical separation.

Regarding the permits, a company inquired, what is the process for declaration without permits. The company encountered this problem when importing traditional goods and failing to grasp the provisions related to specialized inspection permit, so should the company apply for a permit after the date of opening a declaration?

The representative from Customs Supervision and Management Department answered that if goods are subject to permit, but the company fails to apply for the permit, under Decree 59/2018, the Customs declaration which has been made will be invalid and the company will sanctioned for administrative violation. That declaration will not be effective and will be cancelled, the tax policy and policies on items declared in the original declaration are no longer valid. The company must apply for permit and declare the information in the permit on a new declaration.

This representative also noted that enterprises have many ways to ask the state management agencies about the permits. In addition, all legal documents are widely publicized and disseminated to enterprises as soon as they are issued. Also, companies can send questions to the consulting division of the General Department of Customs for specific answers When the revised Circular 38 is applied, there will be tools to support enterprises when declaring on the system through warnings for goods subject to specialized inspection.

Comments for draft revised Circular No. 38 frankly received VCN - The General Department of Customs held four conferences to collect opinions of local Customs and ...

Regarding e-documents, enterprises raised a question whether scanned documents sent to the E-customs declaration system must be signed and sealed by the company’s representative or not? Scanning for the signed and sealed copy or the original? In regard to this question, the representative said that the Circular only requires a copy from the original. If being submitted in paper dossier, these documents must be certified by signature and seal. If being submitted in electronic dossier, these documents have been certified by digital signature, so enterprises are not required to sign and seal to scan.