Indian Customs goes HI-TECH
Accredited Clients Programme and Risk Management System (RMS)
“The ever increasing volumes and complexity of international trade and the deteriorating global security scenario present formidable challenges to Customs. The exponential growth in trade volumes means that the traditional approach of scrutinizing every document and examining every consignment will simply not work, as it would neither be desirable nor possible to constantly increase the resources with the increasing workload. Also, there is a need to reduce the dwell-time of cargo at the ports and airports and to reduce the transaction costs in order to enhance the competitiveness of Indian businesses, by expediting release of cargo where compliance is high. This necessitates that the department should be selective in its approach to deployment of its resources. The advances in Information Technology offer an opportunity to address these challenges faced by the department by putting in place an effective risk management system.''
Looks like the Board is serious about using those computers. Now they are talking about Accredited Clients Programme and Risk Management System (RMS). Importers registered by the department as 'Accredited Clients' under the Accredited Clients Programme will form a separate category to which assured facilitation would be provided and they can clear their goods on self assessment basis. Separate storage space, handling facility and expeditious clearance procedures will be made available for these clients.
Who are accredited clients?
To be eligible for this status the importer should have
1. imported goods valued at Rs Ten Crores or paid more than Rs One Crore of Customs duty in the previous financial year or paid Central Excise Duties over Rs. One Crore from the Personal Ledger Account in the previous financial year.
2. filed at least 25 Bills of Entry in the previous year
3. no cases booked against them under customs, excise or Service Tax, that is no Show Cause Notice invoking penal provision. (This one clause will remove all assessees and importers out of this elite group.)
4. no cases booked under any of the Allied Acts being implemented by Customs
5. good quality declarations.
6. no duty demands pending on account of non-fulfillment of Export obligation
7. reliable systems of record keeping and internal controls
The government should conduct a survey and find out how many importers would qualify in the above test. May be not more than ten in the whole country!
Risk Management Systems
With the introduction of the RMS, the present practice of routine assessment, concurrent audit and examination of almost all Bills of Entry will be discontinued and the focus will be on quality assessment, examination and Post Clearance Audit of Bills of Entry selected by the Risk Management System
For detailed analyses of the schemes, please see our Breaking News.
Circular No. 42 and , Dated: November 24, 2005