Limited Customs power in handling of administrative violations causes many offenders to not abide by the Law

Customs inspect illegal goods in imported containers from France in October, 2016 Photo: Q.H

The power to impose penalties for administrative violations of Customs is specified in the Law on handling of Administrative Violations and Decree No. 127/2013/ND-CP dated November 15, 2013. Accordingly, the Teams and Marine Enforcement Fleet are only allowed to seize illegal goods with a value not exceeding 25 million vnd for individuals and not more than 50 million vnd for organizations; the Department Director's power is only to fine and seize illegal goods with a value not exceeding 50 million vnd for individuals and 100 million vnd for organizations.

Through discussions with a Customs correspondent, some Customs officers in charge of fighting smuggling and trade fraud and consultancy in handling violations in provincial Customs said that the above regulations are inconsistent. Because, in fact Customs seized many cases with illegal goods values which are many times higher than those stipulated in Decree 127.

In the Quang Tri Customs Department, the Department handles about 500 cases of administrative Customs offences each year. The units having cases frequently arising include: the Customs Enforcement Team, the Anti-drug Enforcement Team and the Lao Bao Trade Zone Customs Branch. Most seized cases with high value such as foreign cigarettes and alcohol; white refined sugar and electronic household goods with total values in excess of the power to handle, which are also transferred by the sub-departments to the Quang Tri Customs Department to handle under the its power.

Typically, on January 30, 2017, the Lao Bao Trade Zone Customs Branch collaborated with the Traffic Police Station on 9 Street to arrest a remodeled vehicle transporting some smuggled goods worth more than 65 million vnd including: 2,100 Ensure Original liquid milk bottles made in the United States and 150kg of white refined sugar made in Thailand. Previously, the Quang Tri Customs Enforcement Team seized 112 bottles of foreign alcohol including 12 bottle of Ballantines 12 (40% Vol, 750 ml/bottle); 24 bottles of Ballantines (40% Vol, 1000 ml/bottle); 32 bottle of Ballantines ( 40% Vol, 750 ml/ bottle); 22 bottles of Chivas 12 (750ml/bottle, 40% Vol); and 24 bottles of Chivas 21 (750ml/bottle, 40% Vol) made in Scotland with a value of over 75 million vnd.

The leaders of the Quang Tri Customs Enforcement Team said that the power to handle administrative violations of Customs still does not deter the offenders. For example, the illegal goods with great value such as electronic household goods, the process of handling must be transferred through many levels, so the dissuasion was not in a timely fashion causing many offenders to not abide by the Law.

Agreeing with the views of representatives of the Quang Tri Customs Department, the representatives of the Anti-smuggling and Offences handling Division (Quang Ninh Customs Department) which is the leading unit to receive and handle the cases from the Customs Branches and Customs Enforcement Teams said, in many cases due to the limitation of competence, the dossiers must be transferred through multiple levels to handle and prolong the time.

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At the Branch and Team level, after the initial dossiers are finished to transfer to the Department but due to exceeding the Department’s power the Department must transfer these dossiers for the People’s Committee to handle, so the cases take a long time , and were not handled in a timely fashion. Some simple cases of which penalties were at low level but were not under the competence of the team leaders of the Customs Enforcement Team, (fine from 2 million vnd to 5 million vnd for one of the violations for illegal goods valued at less than 50 million vnd - correspondent) and were still transferred to the Department for settlement. Besides, the Integrated Control Station of Km15- Dan Tien Pier (the anti-smuggling unit on Highway 18) did not have the power to impose the penalties for administrative violations.

Related to the above obstacles, the local Customs Departments collected and reported to the General Department of Vietnam Customs. Accordingly, the units proposed to increase the value of illegal goods in competence in handling of Customs. Particularly for the Quang Ninh Customs Department, this Department proposed on the additional competence in penalties for the administrative violations for the head of the Integrated Control Station of Km15- Dan Tien Pier.