CBP FEE CHANGES, UPCOMING CHINA SECTION 301 DUTY CHANGES

TOC Logistics International would like to provide the following update regarding China Section 301 Duty Changes:

As determined by the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have updated the amounts for merchandise processing fees (MPF) to reflect cost inflation as determined by the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act), which was signed in 2015 to require annual review of fees to maintain equilibrium with inflation.

This annual review is set to take effect at the start of the fiscal year which, for the U.S. government, was October 1, 2019.

The updated information about the COBRA fees was announced in the Federal Register on August 2, 2019.

Important changes to note are:

• Merchandise processing fee (MPF) minimums and maximums are now increased from $26.22 and $508.70 to $26.79 and $519.79, respectively.
• There is no change to the MPF ad valorem rate of 0.3464%.
• The informal entry fee will go from $2.10 to $2.14
• There are other fees for truck, rail, vessel and aircraft arrivals which can be read in the Federal Register notice.

China 301 duties slated to increase by 5% on October 15th.

Last month, the President delayed the planned October 1st increase in Section 301 duties for lists 1, 2 and 3 for goods from China as a gesture of good will towards China’s 70th anniversary celebration of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, as well as in observation of the annual Golden Days holidays.

Next week, delegations from the United States and China are expected to be back at the negotiating table, but until we have a published announcement from the government, the planned duty increase from 25% to 30% will move ahead on October 15th.

On September 20th and on October 2nd there were a number of exception lists published on the USTR’s website. Clicking on the hyperlinked bullets below will lead you to the USTR’s page for the list. Please scroll to the bottom of the pages to see the updates to the respective lists.

• List one updates – Published September 20th and October 2nd.
• List two updates – Published September 20th and October 2nd.
• List three update – Published September 20th.

As always, thank you for allowing TOC Logistics to serve you.