Emphasizing risk factors for which importers should be aware and the importance of taking compliance measures to mitigate them, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)’s trade and travel report notes a significant increase in its efforts to enforce trade remedies in 2018, according to an advance copy reported in the Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg (ST&R) Trade Report.
The CBP report said in fiscal year 2018, the agency collected about $52 billion in tariffs, taxes and other fees, including more than $40.6 billion in tariffs, an increase of nearly 23 percent over fiscal year 2017, according to ST&R.
Much of this increase was attributable to the Section 201 safeguards on washing machines, washing machine parts, and solar cells and panels; the Section 232 tariffs on steel and aluminum goods; and the Section 301 tariffs on imports.
As of Dec. 19, 2018, CBP had assessed around $527 million in Section 201 tariffs, more than $1.1 billion in Section 232 aluminum tariffs, more than $3.4 billion in Section 232 steel tariffs, and more than $8 billion in Section 301 tariffs on goods from China.
CBP began enforcing 53 new antidumping and/or countervailing duty (AD/CV) orders, bringing the total number of orders in effect to 469 and the value of imports subject to those orders to $24.2 billion, ST&R reported.
To enforce these orders, CBP levied more than $92.1 million in monetary penalties on importers for fraud, gross negligence and negligence with respect to AD/CV violations, conducted reviews that resulted in the recovery of more than $65.5 million in AD/CV duties owed, identified through audits approximately $25 million in AD/CV duties owed and seized shipments with a domestic value of more than $1.3 million for AD/CV violations.
CBP also saw an increase in activity under the Enforce and Protect Act to combat the evasion of AD/CV duty orders on products such as aluminum extrusions, plywood, hangers, pencils, bedroom furniture, steel flanges, and diamond sawblades, according to ST&R.