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customs: individual brokerage for single items

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fireworks
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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby fireworks » March 5th, 2020, 8:10 am

boxy wrote:Air condition units cannot be imported/cleared without an import Licence This falls under the Ministry of Trade - Licence unit
Customs won't release your goods without the presentation of said Licence. They don't need to read literature u provide as that is not within their purvue. Try to get your Licence sorted before it arrives similarly to what is Done with cars.
Ben_spanna wrote:Try bringing in an air conditioner that has the new gases in it.. alot of those fking morons in customs are not fimilar with the new standard and emerging changes in GAses and they will hold your item for Months , even when you have provided all literature for them to go along with it....they just too friking lazy and dont have time to read all dat so they leave your items right there..meanwhile you are incurring rent.
This place really going backwards! :roll:


Silly thing is I imported my own AC units. Without a license. Cleared no problem.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby sMASH » March 5th, 2020, 9:11 am

a time i brought down a hunting camo 3/4 during christmas rush. it was the exact same pattern and colors of our regiment. it looked different online when i ordered it ... i gave it away to a police i did kno.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby boxy » March 5th, 2020, 9:24 am

These two are exact examples of my point and why they doing what they doing now. Along with businesses grossly under valuing invoices.

sMASH wrote:a time i brought down a hunting camo 3/4 during christmas rush. it was the exact same pattern and colors of our regiment. it looked different online when i ordered it ... i gave it away to a police i did kno.
fireworks wrote:
boxy wrote:Air condition units cannot be imported/cleared without an import Licence This falls under the Ministry of Trade - Licence unit
Customs won't release your goods without the presentation of said Licence. They don't need to read literature u provide as that is not within their purvue. Try to get your Licence sorted before it arrives similarly to what is Done with cars.
Ben_spanna wrote:Try bringing in an air conditioner that has the new gases in it.. alot of those fking morons in customs are not fimilar with the new standard and emerging changes in GAses and they will hold your item for Months , even when you have provided all literature for them to go along with it....they just too friking lazy and dont have time to read all dat so they leave your items right there..meanwhile you are incurring rent.
This place really going backwards! :roll:


Silly thing is I imported my own AC units. Without a license. Cleared no problem.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby hydroep » March 5th, 2020, 9:27 am

Tried contacting a couple of couriers to find out what effect this is having on their services/rates. Either the lines jam up or they ducking because nobody answering the phones...:|

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby hydroep » March 6th, 2020, 1:52 am

Customs rule, ‘a wild, mad stunt’
Andrew Gioannetti

Stakeholders in the business community, comprising various local chambers of commerce are imploring government and the Comptroller of Customs and Excise to adjust a new customs rule that has considerably lengthened the time it takes to clear goods and puts an additional cost to businessmen.

Government came in for stinging criticism from several well-known members of the business community, with representatives from companies and organisations including DHL, FedEx, EZone, Trinidad Systems Ltd and the TT Manufacturers Association, jointly hosting a media conference at the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) office in Maraval Road, Newtown, on Thursday. AmCham CEO Nirad Tewarie said the current situation was debilitating to business. “I reiterate,” he said, “far from facilitating legitimate trade, what is happening now is frustrating legitimate trade, and it must be reversed if the country which is trying to get out of a recession, is to have a chance to do so by allowing business to what business needs to do.”

The legislation requires all commercial entries to be cleared by a broker. Specifically, a customs broker must be hired to fill out the required documentation, irrespective of the value of the shipment. As such, stakeholders have asked that legislation be adjusted to allow for commercial purchases at $20,000 and below, to be cleared as a non-trade/free entry. This, the chamber says, will significantly aid the ease of doing business.

Tewarie said the chamber wrote to Minister of Finance Colm Imbert last May, expressing concern that the system was going to cause difficulties and asked for more dialogue. “When the intermittent implementation started, we then wrote to the attorney general in November, 2019, asking for a change in the legislation to legalise the $20,000 (limit).

It was then implemented in February. Tewarie said, with the backlog, the average clearance time is five days. TTMA director Dale Parson gave his take on the process, explaining, “If you bring in a sensitive part (for a machine) that is $100, what you now have to do is prepare a customs entry, which will cost you about $300 to stamp. You are only allowed 48 hours rent free space at the airport. “So, by the time you get notice that the part has arrived, 24 hours gone. By the time you prepare the customs entry, another 24 hours gone. By the time you get customs clearance, it’s another two, three days. So you’re now paying rent for a hundred-dollar part that you’re waiting on and you have 200 people sitting, waiting on this part because you can’t run the factory.

President of the Downtown Owners and Merchants Association (DOMA) and director of Jimmy Aboud Textiles, Gregory Aboud described the rule as a “wild, mad stunt.”

He said, “I don’t think it is right for any of us as citizens...forget business people, to stand and watch a foolish policy, implemented in a stunt-like manner, that is going to create not only difficulties in the way we run our businesses (but) it is actually going to deaden the investment climate and the attitude of people towards the future of this country.

Several of those expressed added concern for people who have to await longer periods or pay exorbitant fees for medical supplies and pharmaceuticals because of the system’s bureaucracy.

Chairman of TSL, Nicholas Galt in a brief statement, said the Minister of Finance, the comptroller of customs, and the business community need to find a way to address the matter. “Yes, you have scamps in this country in all walks of life, but all of us you are seeing inside here today, and many others (in the business community) are involved in very good and legitimate businesses that actually make this country work,” Galt said.


https://newsday.co.tt/2020/03/06/customs-rule-a-wild-mad-stunt/

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby hydroep » March 6th, 2020, 1:57 am

Businesses want new Customs payment plan scrapped
Joel Julien

A blood sam­ple was shipped in­to this coun­try that need­ed to be tak­en to a lab­o­ra­to­ry ur­gent­ly for test­ing.

How­ev­er, be­cause of the cur­rent de­lays be­ing ex­pe­ri­enced to clear shipped items, that sam­ple will most like­ly go bad.

The time frame for the clear­ance of items is now six days on av­er­age.

Pre­vi­ous­ly items were cleared the same day.

This is an ex­am­ple of the "chaos" cur­rent­ly be­ing faced in this coun­try for per­sons try­ing to ship in items, An­drea Davis the coun­try man­ag­er for DHL said yes­ter­day.

But the sit­u­a­tion is not on­ly af­fect­ing in­di­vid­u­als but al­so small and large busi­ness­es and even em­bassies.

Davis was among sev­er­al of this coun­try's cham­bers, busi­ness as­so­ci­a­tions and lo­gis­tics com­pa­nies that came to­geth­er yes­ter­day to call on the gov­ern­ment to im­me­di­ate­ly re­scind the sys­tem cur­rent­ly in place to clear items shipped in­to this coun­try as they say it is "ex­treme­ly de­bil­i­tat­ing".

Davis said DHL does rough­ly around 700 ship­ments dai­ly and 90 per cent of them are cur­rent­ly be­ing bond­ed.

DHL is one of sev­er­al couri­er com­pa­nies op­er­at­ing here.

"When you have some­body who is go­ing in­to surgery for a stent and that stent comes in and that stent is US$100 and the man can­not have that surgery on a Thurs­day and the spe­cial­ist flies out or they have no oth­er op­er­at­ing time the next week what hap­pens then?" eZone CEO Paul Pan­tin said.

Pan­tin said the de­lays could be cost­ing US$50,000 a day.

"Far from fa­cil­i­tat­ing le­git­i­mate trade what is hap­pen­ing now is frus­trat­ing le­git­i­mate trade and it must be re­versed if the coun­try, which is try­ing to get out of a re­ces­sion, is to have a chance to do so by al­low­ing busi­ness to do what busi­ness needs to do," chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer of the Amer­i­can Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce Ni­rad Tewarie said yes­ter­day.

Yes­ter­day's meet­ing was held at AM­CHAM's head of­fice on Mar­aval Road in Port-of-Spain and in­clud­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Man­u­fac­tur­ers As­so­ci­a­tion, the T&T Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce, and the Down­town Own­ers and Mer­chants As­so­ci­a­tion among oth­ers.

Tewarie said in 2011 the then min­is­ter of fi­nance in a bud­get state­ment recog­nis­ing the in­ef­fi­cien­cy at the air­port and ease of do­ing busi­ness and recog­nis­ing the growth of the lo­gis­tics in­dus­try pack­ages un­der $20,000 for com­mer­cial and in­di­vid­ual use would not re­quire bond­ing.

In 2018 Cus­toms and Ex­cise said be­cause there was no change in the law this prac­tice was not le­gal and need­ed to be fixed.

As a re­sult Cus­toms start­ed im­ple­ment­ing new mea­sures to deal with this sit­u­a­tion.

"It is caus­ing a sig­nif­i­cant dis­rup­tion in busi­ness op­er­a­tions," Tewarie said.

Tewarie said a big part of cus­toms man­date is to fa­cil­i­tate le­git­i­mate trade and not just to col­lect rev­enue and sup­port the bor­ders.

"What we would like to see hap­pen now is an im­me­di­ate re­ver­sion to the old sys­tem, and we are will­ing to work with cus­toms to im­ple­ment the new sys­tem in an ef­fi­cient man­ner. That's Op­tion A. Op­tion B which to us is more de­sir­able be­cause it is just makes more sense is that we re­vert to the old sys­tem im­me­di­ate­ly and the gov­ern­ment changes the law to al­low for the items val­ued at less than $20,000 to come in as they were pre­vi­ous­ly," he said.

Tewarie said this was the first time un­der his tenure as AM­CHAM CEO the groups came to­geth­er in this man­ner.

"This is not our style, we do not like do­ing things like this. We be­lieve in di­a­logue and col­lab­o­ra­tion to find so­lu­tions but the sit­u­a­tion fac­ing us at the air­port and by us I mean the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty in par­tic­u­lar but it is start­ing to spill over to af­fect in­di­vid­u­als now is in­creas­ing­ly se­vere at a time when we can­not af­ford it," he said.

Aboud said the sit­u­a­tion cur­rent­ly fac­ing the coun­ty with the ship­ping in of items is "worse than the coro­n­avirus". ( :lol: )

"I would like to say that prob­a­bly the most re­spect­ful way I can re­fer to this is as a wild, mad stunt, and the rea­son I can say that with some sense of con­fi­dence about the char­ac­ter­i­sa­tion of this as a stunt is that this has ac­tu­al­ly been done with ze­ro in­ter­ac­tion or con­sid­er­a­tion for the de­struc­tion of con­fi­dence and the road­block that it cre­ates," Aboud said.

TTMA Di­rec­tor Dale Par­sons, FedEx Op­er­a­tions Man­ag­er Shameel Man­dol and FedEx Coun­try Man­ag­er Stephen De­Fre­itas al­so at­tend­ed yes­ter­day's meet­ing.

T&T Cham­ber CEO Gabriel Faria was un­able to at­tend yes­ter­day's meet­ing but sent a mes­sage voic­ing his sup­port.


https://www.guardian.co.tt/news/businesses-want-new-customs-payment-plan-scrapped-6.2.1072500.53d9c7961d

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby The_Honourable » March 6th, 2020, 10:35 am

hydroep wrote:Can't help but think (given customs unpreparedness to deal with the situation) that this thing has been implemented as a sort of short-man...ah mean "smart man" way to reduce the demand for forex.

If things become that much more expensive a significant chunk of discretionary purchases from small to medium entities in the private sector gonna fall off a cliff leaving more US$ for the big boys...:|


Had the same thought as this tactic leading back to the short man minister.

US reserves are dwindling and the online tax not working effectively as he thought. Many moved to credit cards but the banks are now clamping down their US limits on the cards.

Agree with your point. It seems as a tactic to reduce demand for forex, squeeze small-mid sized businesses maybe out of business, and protect the big businesses. Short man already made his opinion known 2-3 years ago about people purchasing and supporting foreign businesses with forex T&T have in reserve.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby Ben_spanna » March 6th, 2020, 10:56 am

boxy wrote:Air condition units cannot be imported/cleared without an import Licence This falls under the Ministry of Trade - Licence unit
Customs won't release your goods without the presentation of said Licence. They don't need to read literature u provide as that is not within their purvue. Try to get your Licence sorted before it arrives similarly to what is Done with cars.
Ben_spanna wrote:Try bringing in an air conditioner that has the new gases in it.. alot of those fking morons in customs are not fimilar with the new standard and emerging changes in GAses and they will hold your item for Months , even when you have provided all literature for them to go along with it....they just too friking lazy and dont have time to read all dat so they leave your items right there..meanwhile you are incurring rent.
This place really going backwards! :roll:


HAd the Import Licence in HAND prior to importing it sir, had ALL documuentation required.. just pure a55 lazyness on the part of the bureau and customs.....

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby toyolink » March 6th, 2020, 11:23 am

Importation of cargo into this country is a function of consumer demand and presently recreational imports has reduced significantly due to decreased disposable incomes.
Draconian customs measures which act as embargos would only serve to encourage black market type market responses which would put more hurt on our forex condition and frustrate the revenue earning possibilities for the state.
Imagine after the placement of a online tax a few years ago, now the state has made online shopping almost impossible for the average individual

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby zoom rader » March 6th, 2020, 11:36 am

toyolink wrote:Importation of cargo into this country is a function of consumer demand and presently recreational imports has reduced significantly due to decreased disposable incomes.
Draconian customs measures which act as embargos would only serve to encourage black market type market responses which would put more hurt on our forex condition and frustrate the revenue earning possibilities for the state.
Imagine after the placement of a online tax a few years ago, now the state has made online shopping almost impossible for the average individual
PNM made for you, they after your money and wants you give money to 1% .

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby dogg » March 6th, 2020, 11:55 am

customs is probably the most corrupt, bobol infested institution in the country

And I take full advantage of it!!

a couple years ago I brought down a large shipment of personal home furnishings etc via sea freight. I calculated the duties to be $14,000 or so. But I had a partner, who have a partner who have a partner.
He tell me when i reach to clear ask for him.
He say tell the officer everything valued at $5000tt.
I see him whisper something to the customs officer.
Officer watch the goods and say $300 due.

So I ended up paying $800 in all.

$500 was for the partner partner partner.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby rspann » March 6th, 2020, 12:08 pm

Bad doggy !

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby pete » March 6th, 2020, 1:33 pm

dogg wrote:customs is probably the most corrupt, bobol infested institution in the country

And I take full advantage of it!!

a couple years ago I brought down a large shipment of personal home furnishings etc via sea freight. I calculated the duties to be $14,000 or so. But I had a partner, who have a partner who have a partner.
He tell me when i reach to clear ask for him.
He say tell the officer everything valued at $5000tt.
I see him whisper something to the customs officer.
Officer watch the goods and say $300 due.

So I ended up paying $800 in all.

$500 was for the partner partner partner.


People like you caused this.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby nemisis » March 6th, 2020, 2:49 pm

^^^^ irony is they don't see it that way

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby Chimera » March 6th, 2020, 3:05 pm

Dogg steal more than most of them bandit on tv who he does say deserve to die for stealing . Wdmc

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby pugboy » March 6th, 2020, 3:56 pm

how much it costs for a officer to let a container thru clear ?

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby daxt0r » March 6th, 2020, 4:08 pm

Phone Surgeon wrote:Dogg steal more than most of them bandit on tv who he does say deserve to die for stealing . Wdmc


yep jus like dem landlords with multiple apartment buildings who don't declare all their extra income, but then want to talk about criminals dis an dat and d government eh doin nothin etc.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby maj. tom » March 6th, 2020, 5:05 pm

but is how this jackass blatantly confessing his bribery and corruption antics that have the place like this.

Is not like a customs officer was feeling nice that day and let him through, he went out of his way to bribe officials to get his goods almost duty free. And then boasting about it here like if that was a heroic deed. Cuntcleft it's you that have the country so, you can't see that?

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby The_Honourable » March 6th, 2020, 9:32 pm

Saw this on fb

Written by Nebert Marin

Please don't be fooled, the 1% are not upset about the new Customs procedure - they are loving it.

First they made the powerful buddies implement the 7% tax for online purchases. They justified that by saying it saves on foreign exchange depletion by discouraging online purchases. But what depletes foreign reserves more, people practicing just in time purchasing of only what they need when they need it or the 1% using up tons of US cash to stockpile their warehouses with the goods they want you to sell you ?

The 7% online tax didn't deter you from making your online purchases because the additional cost was still less than their 300% markups. So they then approached their elected buddies to prioritize the allocation of US currency for their businesses by passing the currency through their manufacturing businesses but using the funds to purchase products for their retail establishments.

Small business responded by making payments with personal credit cards instead of wire transfers. How did the 1% respond ??? by lobbying the banks to restrict credit card purchasing limits. That attempt to try steering customers their way didn't have the desired effect either so what next...?

They've gone back to their buddies in power to disrupt your shipping process while simultaneously having their lobbying group launch an anti-counterfeit goods campaign to once again steer customers their way. In this case however it's not counterfeit good though, just goods that they don't sell like detergent at the side of the road.

Until you see the 1% lining up in the bank just like you to beg to get a lil US$100 to travel, don't believe for a second that they're upset with all that is being done to disrupt small business and your ability to make a living or the suffering you're going through. #ThePowerOf99Percent, #Power99.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby paid_influencer » March 6th, 2020, 9:48 pm

the genius of the 1% is divide and conquer.

the people most hurt by this move are small businesses that bring in things from Amazon, ebay, etc., for their own business operations or resale. The average person is not a business, so there is (1) no concern, (2) no information, and (3) no unity.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby zoom rader » March 6th, 2020, 10:02 pm

The_Honourable wrote:Saw this on fb

Written by Nebert Marin

Please don't be fooled, the 1% are not upset about the new Customs procedure - they are loving it.

First they made the powerful buddies implement the 7% tax for online purchases. They justified that by saying it saves on foreign exchange depletion by discouraging online purchases. But what depletes foreign reserves more, people practicing just in time purchasing of only what they need when they need it or the 1% using up tons of US cash to stockpile their warehouses with the goods they want you to sell you ?

The 7% online tax didn't deter you from making your online purchases because the additional cost was still less than their 300% markups. So they then approached their elected buddies to prioritize the allocation of US currency for their businesses by passing the currency through their manufacturing businesses but using the funds to purchase products for their retail establishments.

Small business responded by making payments with personal credit cards instead of wire transfers. How did the 1% respond ??? by lobbying the banks to restrict credit card purchasing limits. That attempt to try steering customers their way didn't have the desired effect either so what next...?

They've gone back to their buddies in power to disrupt your shipping process while simultaneously having their lobbying group launch an anti-counterfeit goods campaign to once again steer customers their way. In this case however it's not counterfeit good though, just goods that they don't sell like detergent at the side of the road.

Until you see the 1% lining up in the bank just like you to beg to get a lil US$100 to travel, don't believe for a second that they're upset with all that is being done to disrupt small business and your ability to make a living or the suffering you're going through. #ThePowerOf99Percent, #Power99.
I explained this but not in so many words. This is 100% true.

Yet still elite pnm ppl lick these people arses.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby zoom rader » March 6th, 2020, 10:07 pm

Folks we need to stand firm and boycott doing any bussiness with 1% .

Just don't buy from them , support local afro and injun bussiness that are not linked to these nasty 1% folk. Stop shopping at their business.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby paid_influencer » March 6th, 2020, 10:20 pm

zoom rader wrote:Folks we need to stand firm and boycott doing any bussiness with 1% .

Just don't buy from them , support local afro and injun bussiness that are not linked to these nasty 1% folk. Stop shopping at their business.


I don't believe in boycotts. Trade benefits all parties. Boycotts would, by necessity, hurt all parties.

What I want is for Indos and Afros to view each other as the same tribe. Too many people walking around with racial goggles and fighting down each other like crabs in barrel.

example: people blaming businesses when customs implements absurd unannounced rule changes.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby VexXx Dogg » March 6th, 2020, 10:36 pm

Disclaimer:
The Angry Mongrel wishes to advise that he is not related to, nor affiliated with, the other Mongrel.

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby pugboy » March 7th, 2020, 6:38 am

yuh ever see what kinda vehicles the 1% and their businesses does use ?
eg all them companies does use mitsubishi panel vans

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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby hydroep » March 7th, 2020, 7:41 am

Doh act surprised, allyuh knew it was coming. Is Dookeran fault...:|

Imbert to meet Customs on bond payment change
Renuka Singh


Ag Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance Colm Imbert lays some papers before the House during yesterday’s sitting of Parliament. Imbert also said he did not give any instructions to the Customs and Excise Division related to a recent decision to change the bond payment policy the Piarco International Airport.

The cur­rent chaos be­ing ex­pe­ri­enced by busi­ness­es with the new pay­ment sys­tem im­ple­ment­ed by Cus­toms and Ex­cise at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port bond is a re­sult of the body en­forc­ing a 2011 law brought about by for­mer min­is­ter of fi­nance Win­ston Dook­er­an.

Act­ing Prime Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert made the com­ment yes­ter­day as he re­spond­ed to ques­tions by Ma­yaro Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment Rush­ton Paray about the pub­lic out­cry from the busi­ness sec­tor re­gard­ing the in­abil­i­ty of Cus­toms and Ex­cise to prop­er­ly man­age the “bond­ing” of all pack­ages in the Ex­press Lo­gis­tics sec­tor. Paray asked Im­bert if he could state whether he will re­con­sid­er this in­struc­tion un­til the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion is prop­er­ly re­sourced to do so.

But Im­bert said Paray’s ques­tion was based on the false premise that Cus­toms and Ex­cise was act­ing on gov­ern­men­tal in­struc­tions.

“There was no in­struc­tion by the Gov­ern­ment to do this, I just want to make that crys­tal clear. The Gov­ern­ment and the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance did not in­struct Cus­toms to do any­thing with re­spect to what is known as Ex­press Lo­gis­tics con­sign­ments,” Im­bert said.

“Ap­par­ent­ly, in 2010/2011 bud­get state­ment, the then min­is­ter of fi­nance, Mr Dook­er­an, had made a state­ment in the bud­get state­ment that goods, con­sign­ments of un­der $20,000 would not re­quire a for­mal cus­toms en­try. In that state­ment, he al­so said that this does not re­quire an amend­ment to the Cus­toms Act.

“It ap­pears, based on pre­lim­i­nary re­search, that that is not cor­rect. It does ap­pear that it does re­quire an amend­ment to the Cus­toms Act. That amend­ment was nev­er made.”

Ac­cord­ing to Im­bert, Cus­toms has just now de­cid­ed to en­force the law.

“The law re­quires both an en­try and a de­c­la­ra­tion,” Im­bert said.

How­ev­er, the new pol­i­cy has re­sult­ed in lengthy de­lays at the bond and prompt­ed sev­er­al busi­ness bod­ies and com­pa­nies to call on the Gov­ern­ment to re­scind the pol­i­cy dur­ing a press con­fer­ence on Thurs­day.

Yes­ter­day, Im­bert said the mat­ter on­ly be­came a pub­licly con­tro­ver­sial one on Thurs­day when those sev­er­al busi­ness cham­bers joint­ly re­vealed their dis­sat­is­fac­tion with the change.

“Pri­or to that, there was no di­rect in­ter­ven­tion or no di­rect en­treaty to the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance. There were dis­cus­sions, ap­par­ent­ly, at a low­er lev­el be­tween busi­ness or­gan­i­sa­tions and Cus­toms,” he said.

Im­bert al­so said that pri­or to Dook­er­an’s rule change in 2011, the val­ue thresh­old for small con­sign­ments that do not re­quire en­try was $1,000. Dook­er­an changed that to $20,000.

“It was strange­ly and mys­te­ri­ous­ly moved from $1000 to $20,000 just so. There was no sci­ence be­hind it,” he said.

Im­bert said that to by­pass the new rules, some com­pa­nies would bring in sev­er­al ship­ments, all un­der $20,000.

“There were ten ship­ments, 20 ship­ments all val­ued at $19,500,” he said.

How­ev­er, he said that with ex­press con­sign­ments, the couri­er ser­vices are now re­quired to pre­pare an en­try which they were not do­ing be­fore and that is where the prob­lem arose.

“I have asked the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion to ex­plain to me ex­act­ly what is hap­pen­ing, what was done over the past ten years or so, what are the con­se­quences and im­pli­ca­tions of what they are do­ing,” he said.

“We are look­ing at it from both sides. One side, the ease of do­ing busi­ness, the oth­er side we would want to avoid leak­age of rev­enue and im­por­ta­tion of il­le­gal items.”

Im­bert said that more prob­lems arise when there is no Cus­toms en­try form.

“You have to un­der­stand that if there is no Cus­toms en­try then the in­for­ma­tion is not be­ing put in­to the com­put­erised sys­tem, mak­ing it im­pos­si­ble for Cus­toms to do ran­dom checks, and to check the man­i­festo to see ex­act­ly what the items are.”

De­spite the stag­na­tion at Cus­toms and Ex­cise due to the new pol­i­cy, Im­bert said he would not be re­act­ing in a “knee-jerk” man­ner to the is­sue.

“We need to be care­ful and not have a knee-jerk re­ac­tion and just jump in­to it,” he said.

He promised to have a re­sponse by the end of next week af­ter he met with the rel­e­vant bod­ies and gath­ered the rel­e­vant in­for­ma­tion.

On Thurs­day, sev­er­al lo­cal busi­ness cham­bers, couri­er com­pa­nies and busi­ness as­so­ci­a­tions called on the Gov­ern­ment to im­me­di­ate­ly re­scind the changes. The amal­ga­mat­ed group claimed that the de­lays meant that some busi­ness­es were los­ing as much as US$50,000 a day.


https://www.guardian.co.tt/news/imbert-to-meet-customs-on-bond-payment-change-6.2.1073388.68b496b597

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zoom rader
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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby zoom rader » March 7th, 2020, 9:32 am

^^^ 1% called those shots and it seems to be backfiring.

Boycott 1% , spend your money and support real local folk.

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zoom rader
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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby zoom rader » March 7th, 2020, 9:34 am

paid_influencer wrote:
zoom rader wrote:Folks we need to stand firm and boycott doing any bussiness with 1% .

Just don't buy from them , support local afro and injun bussiness that are not linked to these nasty 1% folk. Stop shopping at their business.


I don't believe in boycotts. Trade benefits all parties. Boycotts would, by necessity, hurt all parties.

What I want is for Indos and Afros to view each other as the same tribe. Too many people walking around with racial goggles and fighting down each other like crabs in barrel.

example: people blaming businesses when customs implements absurd unannounced rule changes.
1% calling the shots bro.

Stop giving your money to these scum

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agent007
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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby agent007 » March 7th, 2020, 9:41 am

I enjoy NB's write ups. I remember his BMW article years ago and knew then, this guy was different. He should have included the true reason why the tax exemption remained to benefit only 3 vehicles. Well said Sir.
zoom rader wrote:
The_Honourable wrote:Saw this on fb

Written by Nebert Marin

Please don't be fooled, the 1% are not upset about the new Customs procedure - they are loving it.

First they made the powerful buddies implement the 7% tax for online purchases. They justified that by saying it saves on foreign exchange depletion by discouraging online purchases. But what depletes foreign reserves more, people practicing just in time purchasing of only what they need when they need it or the 1% using up tons of US cash to stockpile their warehouses with the goods they want you to sell you ?

The 7% online tax didn't deter you from making your online purchases because the additional cost was still less than their 300% markups. So they then approached their elected buddies to prioritize the allocation of US currency for their businesses by passing the currency through their manufacturing businesses but using the funds to purchase products for their retail establishments.

Small business responded by making payments with personal credit cards instead of wire transfers. How did the 1% respond ??? by lobbying the banks to restrict credit card purchasing limits. That attempt to try steering customers their way didn't have the desired effect either so what next...?

They've gone back to their buddies in power to disrupt your shipping process while simultaneously having their lobbying group launch an anti-counterfeit goods campaign to once again steer customers their way. In this case however it's not counterfeit good though, just goods that they don't sell like detergent at the side of the road.

Until you see the 1% lining up in the bank just like you to beg to get a lil US$100 to travel, don't believe for a second that they're upset with all that is being done to disrupt small business and your ability to make a living or the suffering you're going through. #ThePowerOf99Percent, #Power99.
I explained this but not in so many words. This is 100% true.

Yet still elite pnm ppl lick these people arses.

toyolink
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Re: customs: individual brokerage for single items

Postby toyolink » March 7th, 2020, 5:35 pm

Compliance with the new rules aint no big thing.
Customers would just have to wait longer for orders and may have to pay more.
If the 1% is behind this and presently they have tons of cargo stuck in the bond, I really wonder what they were thinking.
BTW, courier companies may very well close-up shop since they would be providing no delivery benefit.

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