Did filling out the customs declaration form wrong cost a Changde boss 150,000 yuan? A tearful lesson for Changde bosses

Mr. Zhang stared at the port storage fee bill on the computer screen, his fingers unconsciously tapping the tabletop. This batch of canned citrus destined for Southeast Asia had been detained at Shanghai Port for two weeks due to an incorrect HS code on the customs declaration form. This was the third delay caused by customs declaration issues this year, with a direct loss of more than 150,000 yuan. "I should have found a professional agent earlier..." He smiled wryly and apologized to the customer on the other end of the phone. Such scenes are repeating on countless Changde foreign trade enterprises.

As the third largest foreign trade city in Hunan, Changde exports agricultural products and mechanical parts worth over 10 billion yuan through customs declaration every year. However, customs data shows that in 2023, the declaration rejection rate at the Changde port was as high as 6.7%, far higher than the provincial average. The reasons are as follows:

• Special supervision of agricultural products: Specialties such as rice noodles and citrus are related to 7 types of additional documents such as quarantine certificates and origin certificates
• HS code pitfalls: The same commodity may correspond to 3-4 different codes at different processing stages
• Rapid policy iteration: After the implementation of the RCEP, the customs duties rules of the ASEAN countries are adjusted every month

After cooperating with Zhongshitong last year, Ms. Li's textile factory reduced its export customs clearance time from an average of 4.2 days to 1.5 days. Behind this are three key supports:

• Pre-classification service: Lock in the commodity code 90 days in advance to avoid the risk of modification after declaration
• Customs affairs sand table: Simulate the entire customs declaration process and help customers avoid document issues 217 times in 2023
• Emergency channel: Establish a 2-hour response mechanism with the port customs in case of abnormal situations

There are many institutions in the market that claim to be "professional in customs declaration", but those that can truly reduce enterprise risks need to have:

• Advanced certification qualifications of the China Customs AEO (only 12% of enterprises in the country have obtained it)
• At least 3 licensed customs declarers on-site service
• No major customs declaration error records in the past 12 months
• Provide a full-process visual tracking system
• Have associated logistics customs clearance capabilities

With the popularization of the cross-border e-commerce models 9710/9810, customs declaration is shifting from "single declaration" to "supply chain-level management". A certain electromechanical enterprise recently had an entire batch of goods returned by the EU because it did not declare the environmental protection label on the packaging. This means:

• Customs declaration agents need to be pre-empted to the product design stage
• Data needs to be connected to the ERP system in real-time
• A database of the regulations of the export destination country needs to be established