Exporters Can Talk Though EEI ‘Speeding Ticket’ Fines With Census, Official Says
Exporters seeing an increase in “speeding ticket” fines (see 1909240034) in their Electronic Export Information filings can reach out to the Census Bureau to try to “remedy” the situation, said Jessica Mangubat, a Census Bureau official. But she stressed that exporters should first direct questions to CBP, which handles EEI enforcement issues.
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Exporters in October told Census they are still facing penalties for minor errors made in Automated Export System filings despite efforts by CBP and Census to rein in those fines (see 2210110012). Mangubat, speaking during a Dec. 13 Regulations and Procedures Technical Advisory Committee meeting, said CBP is mainly in charge of those penalties, but exporters who believe they received an “egregious” fine and are unsure why they were penalized should reach out to Census.
“We always advise getting in touch with our office to talk through it, because there certainly could be something in our area that we may be able to do, or a conversation we may be able to have, to kind of help remedy this issue or understand what might be going on,” Mangubat said. “Sometimes it is possible that it could just be an issue of interpretation of the Foreign Trade Regulations. And once it's clarified, it's understood, [Census may say] ‘OK, well, then maybe that shouldn't have been a violation.’”
CBP earlier this year said it sometimes issues warnings to first-time offenders for EEI filing errors but may decide to penalize repeat violators (see 2210120008). The agency also said it provides mitigation guidelines for those penalties.