Managing e-commerce activities for import – export goods

Customs official of Bien Hoa Customs Branch (Dong Nai Customs Department) checked imported – exported goods. Photo: N.Hiền.

The objective of the scheme is to build a system to receive and process information related to imported and exported goods of e-commerce transactions based on the National Single Window mechanism and ASEAN single window mechanism, facilitate transaction control and speed up the cargo clearance because of the availability of a database.

One of the solutions to manage e-commerce activities for export and import goods is the solution on completing the legal basis related to e-commerce activities for exported and imported goods.

Regarding solutions on customs procedures, customs procedures must be simple and fast, ensure management of customs authorities, correctly and fully collect import and export duty and prevent trade fraud. To meet this requirement, parties involved in e-commerce transactions must send in advance to the Customs Management System.

With solutions on licensing, conditions, specialised inspection and supplementing the provisions on the exemption of licenses, exemption from conditions and specialised inspection for goods subject to licensing, conditions, and specialised inspection in the following cases:

- Having customs value of VND 1,000,000 or less, except for cases that ministries managing sectors send notices to the General Department of Vietnam Customs about goods are not exempted from permits, conditions and specialised inspection;

- Having a customs value of more than VND 1,000,000 but goods are on the list of goods exempt from licenses, conditions and specialised inspection in accordance with a certain quantity, it would be exempted from licenses, conditions and specialised inspection. Organisations and individuals can’t collect goods according to the criteria for exemption from licenses, conditions and specialised inspection of other organisations and individuals buying goods trading via other e-commerce. Violations will be handled in accordance with the law.

Regarding the time for updating specialised inspection results, specialised inspection results for exported and imported goods transacted via e-commerce need to be updated on the processing system within two hours at the latest after the release of results. However, the deadline for updating results should not be later than the time of notification of specialised inspection of exported and imported goods.

At the same time, to ensure the protection of food safety, avoid the spread of epidemics, environmental pollution affecting national security, it is stipulated: cases of exemption from licenses, conditions and specialised inspection are not applied in cases where ministries managing sectors and fields which have warnings about food safety, spread of epidemics, harms to human health and life, polluted the environment and affected the social morality, traditions and customs, dangerous to the economy, national security or issue a written notice of stopping application of specialised inspection exemption before customs clearance.

Provisions on goods being deposited in bonded warehouses (having not completed import procedures), specialised management agencies are responsible for granting permit procedures, specialised inspection and conditions as requested by enterprise which is a commodity owner or authorised by the owner to carry out procedures in Vietnam. After obtaining the results of licensing, conditions and specialised inspection, the customs authority will carry out the deduction on the license, conditions and specialised inspection to implement import procedures for each order when imported into Vietnam.

Building customs electronic data processing system for import and export goods

Another solution of the scheme is to build a database related to e-commerce activities for exported and imported goods.

Specifically, to ensure there is a database to perform the management of exported and imported goods traded via e-commerce, it is necessary to build a Customs electronic data processing system for import and export goods traded via electronic commerce. It should have the following characteristics:

- The system is built should included in the overall system of managing exports and imports; receiving and storing information related to e-commerce transactions.

- Update information about e-commerce exchange, e-commerce website (information about promotions, sales policies, information about carriers and sellers) and other management mechanisms and policies on e-commerce (tax policies, commodity codes and a list of goods subject to specialised inspection).

- Processing received information and sharing to other systems for serving needs of management; decentralised rights to entities participating in the system; perform information processing on the system to implement: feedback to data transmitters, feedback to relevant management agencies; conduct risk assessment and warnings to management units; transmitting processed data to other related systems for cargo clearance process; storing necessary information for statistical and reporting activities, which is input for information processing processes of industries, sectors and the State.