WASHINGTON — U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced as of Feb. 28, 2006, CBP will not accept carriers faxing confirmation as proof of PAPS being sent to brokers. The carriers must confirm the PAPS is accepted in CBP system at least 1 hour or 30 minutes (FAST loads) before arriving at the border.

CBP will deny entry to non ACE trucks that have
not advanced cargo info to CBP in time

Currently, when a truck arrives at a port and the required cargo information has not been transmitted to CBP, no enforcement action is taken if the driver is able to present proof that the required electronic cargo information was sent to an ABI filer prior to the arrival at the port. This procedure was implemented under the assumption that the carrier did not have the ability to transmit cargo information to CBP and had to depend upon a third party to transmit the required cargo information to CBP on the carrier.

With the implementation of the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) at various border points, the carrier no longer has to depend upon the ABI filer to transmit the required cargo information to CBP. Instead, the carrier may choose to participate in ACE and transmit the required electronic cargo information directly to CBP. Subsequently, it is the carrier’s business decision to send the required electronic cargo information to CBP via an ABI filer, or directly to CBP via ACE by becoming an ACE participant, CBP says.

Effective on February 28, 2006 CBP will deny entry to any non-ACE participating commercial conveyance that has not successfully transmitted advance cargo information (PAPS, QP) to CBP by the time of arrival, the agency stated in a release.

In the case of quota live entries, the manifest must clearly identify quota merchandise, and these shipments shall be referred to secondary for processing. For now quota class merchandise is exempted from the advance manifesting requirements (PAPS, QP) of the Trade Act, since the entry/entry summary will be prepared after the carrier arrives in secondary.

In cases where an ACE participant arrives at the border and has failed to comply with the Trade Act, the driver will be referred to secondary, where he will wait until the required cargo information is electronically received by CBP. Once the required cargo information is received, the conveyance and cargo will be processed in accordance with existing procedures. In the meantime, no penalty or denial of entry will be taken against an ACE participating driver who fails to comply with the Trade Act in this respect.

For ports that do not currently have ACE, the provisions of this policy shall be implemented 30 days after the date ACE was fully deployed and operational.

Questions via E-mail may be directed to the group mailbox at Manifest.Branch@dhs.gov.