Automated Commercial Environment (ACE)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a CSMS message advising the trade that the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (HTS) information displayed in the ACE Secure Data Portal is out of date, and will not be updated. The version listed is from July 2007. To obtain the most current HTS data, CBP directs the trade to the International Trade Commission's Web site: http://www.usitc.gov/tata/hts/. (CSMS 08-000093, dated 05/29/08, available at http://apps.cbp.gov/csms/viewmssg.asp?Recid=17101&page=&srch_argv=&srchtype=&btype=&sortby=&sby)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted three additional chapters and a table of contents to its "ACE ABI CATAIR" document that it is building to replace the current Customs and Trade Automated Interface Requirements (CATAIR) document.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued its weekly tariff rate quota and tariff preference level commodity report as of May 27, 2008. This report includes TRQs on various products such as beef, sugar, dairy products, peanuts, cotton, cocoa products, tobacco, certain BFTA, DR-CAFTA, Israel FTA, JFTA, MFTA, SFTA, UAFTA (AFTA) and UCFTA (Chile FTA) non-textile TRQs, etc. Each report also includes the AGOA, ATPDEA, BFTA, DR-CAFTA, CBTPA, Haitian HOPE, MFTA, NAFTA, SFTA, and UCFTA TPLs and TRQs for qualifying apparel and/or other textile articles, the TRQs on worsted wool fabrics, etc. (CBP's weekly TRQ/TPL commodity report available at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/trade/trade_programs/textiles_and_quotas/commodity/)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a CSMS message announcing the effective date for the implementation of its new policy regarding the suspension of Automated Commercial Environment account access for ACE Secure Data Portal accounts that have been inactive for 45 days.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted an updated version of its "ACE on the Road" event schedule, which includes the following events:

At the April 2008 National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America's Annual Conference, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection official spoke about the Action Plan for Import Safety¹ and CBP's initiatives for improving import safety.

During the May 9, 2008 meeting of the Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Related Homeland Security Functions (COAC), CBP officials discussed a variety of issues related to customs bonds, highlights of which include:

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued its weekly tariff rate quota and tariff preference level commodity report as of May 19, 2008. This report includes TRQs on various products such as beef, sugar, dairy products, peanuts, cotton, cocoa products, tobacco, certain BFTA, DR-CAFTA, Israel FTA, JFTA, MFTA, SFTA, UAFTA (AFTA) and UCFTA (Chile FTA) non-textile TRQs, etc. Each report also includes the AGOA, ATPDEA, BFTA, DR-CAFTA, CBTPA, Haitian HOPE, MFTA, NAFTA, SFTA, and UCFTA TPLs and TRQs for qualifying apparel and/or other textile articles, the TRQs on worsted wool fabrics, etc. (CBP's weekly TRQ/TPL commodity report available at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/trade/trade_programs/textiles_and_quotas/commodity/)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a CSMS message announcing that, effective immediately, the ACE Modernization information section of CBP's Web site can no longer be accessed using Quicklinks. An attachment to CBP's CSMS message includes instructions for accessing the ACE Modernization information section. (CSMS 08-000087, dated 05/19/08, available at http://apps.cbp.gov/csms/viewmssg.asp?Recid=17095&page=&srch_argv=08-000087&srchtype=all&btype=&sortby=&sby.)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued ACE Portal Accounts and Truck Manifest CSMS messages announcing that as of 8:33 a.m. on May 18, 2008 ACE Portal users were unable to login in. CBP sources state that this problem was fixed on the afternoon of May 18, 2008. (CSMS s 08-000085 & 08-000086, dated 05/18/08, available at http://apps.cbp.gov/csms/csms.asp)