Saturday 25 September, 2021

Recently, the General Department of Customs has received documents from a number of provincial and municipal Customs Departments and the business community requesting that Customs authorities consider not imposing administrative penalties in certain cases of violations occurring in the customs sector due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the Government’s social-distancing and epidemic-control measures, including the following cases:

(i) Goods are on the list subject to state quality inspection, but foreign experts have not been able to enter Vietnam to install accessories needed to carry out the prescribed quality inspection of the goods.

(ii) Imported goods (chemicals) have no storage tanks and cannot be consumed, so they must remain at the port and customs declarations cannot be made within the prescribed time limit.

(iii) Enterprises fail to submit finalization reports or submit reports on the use of duty-free goods late because of social distancing and the absence of employees at work.

(iv) Enterprises cannot arrange financial resources to pay taxes on all shipments that have arrived in Vietnam within 30 days from the date the goods arrive at the border gate.

(v) Enterprises cannot register declarations or take delivery of goods within 30 days from the date the goods arrive at the border gate because they operate in locked-down areas.

(vi) Enterprises cannot re-export goods in accordance with an administrative-penalty decision because of social distancing and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

(vii) Enterprises cannot re-export or re-import goods within the prescribed time limit or the time limit registered with Customs authorities because of social distancing and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

(viii) Some Customs units have F0 cases and implement social distancing, making them unable to draw up administrative-violation records or receive dossiers and violation exhibits for verification and clarification so that violations can be handled within the prescribed time limit.

The General Department issued Official Letter No. 3569/TCHQ-PC dated 03/6/2020 regarding non-imposition of administrative penalties for violations in the customs sector due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2021, the Covid-19 pandemic was expected to continue having a major impact on goods export and import activities. Therefore, to ensure proper implementation of the principles and regulations on handling violations while supporting and facilitating enterprises engaged in export-import activities, the General Department of Customs requires units to:

1. When considering non-imposition of administrative penalties on the grounds of the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the Government’s social-distancing and epidemic-control measures, base the consideration on the 2012 Law on Handling Administrative Violations (Articles 2 and 11), Decree 128/2020/ND-CP dated 19/10/2020 (Article 6), and the case file in order to apply the provision on “force majeure event” to each specific case.

2. Compile statistics and specifically report the following: enterprises’ petitions and difficulties relating to administrative penalties in the customs sector; the backlog of cases and administrative-violation handling dossiers that cannot be resolved on time or cannot be handled for reasons such as the cases mentioned above and other cases arising in the unit’s actual operations; and remedial measures implemented by Customs authorities and enterprises.

Reports must be sent to the General Department of Customs (Legal Department) before 30/9/2021./.