On the morning of August 3, at the First Extraordinary Session of the 16th National Assembly, Member of the Party Central Committee, Minister of Finance Ngo Van Tuan presented the submission of the Draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Customs Law.
Reforming customs procedures, promoting voluntary compliance
Presenting before the National Assembly, Member of the Party Central Committee, Minister of Finance Ngo Van Tuan said that the development of the above Draft Law aims to institutionalize the guidelines and policies in 10 documents of the Central Executive Committee, Politburo, National Assembly, Government, and Prime Minister, focusing on innovating a streamlined apparatus, operating effectively and efficiently; reducing administrative procedures, providing full online public services, regardless of geography;
Transparency, automation, application of AI and big data in customs operation processes; strengthening e-commerce management, data sharing connection; reviewing and unifying decentralization and delegation of power according to the Law on Organization of the Government.
The draft revised Customs Law focuses on amending and supplementing many regulations to modernize customs management, promote the application of digital technology and reduce administrative procedures. In which, the draft supplements the principle of post-customs clearance inspection based on risk management, compliance management and digital technology; consolidates post-customs clearance inspection procedures, extends the maximum inspection period to 20 days (old regulations were 10 working days)...
The draft also supplements many new regulations such as the concept of customs inspection, compliance management, business locations for duty-free goods; supplementing the legal basis for managing import and export goods through e-commerce; perfecting regulations on bonded warehouses, duty-free stores, transit goods and strengthening the protection of intellectual property rights.
Notably, the draft proposes to cut and simplify administrative procedures such as removing conditions for agents carrying out customs procedures; simplifying dossiers, the national single window mechanism...; increasing the storage time of goods at bonded warehouses and business locations for duty-free goods to 24 months, goods at retail collection locations to 180 days and removing the regulation on procedures for applying for extension.
Reduce the reporting obligations of enterprises, increase the application of information technology in management and allow customs declarants to proactively notify the route of transportation of goods subject to customs supervision without the need for customs agency approval...
Carefully review, avoid overlapping regulations
Presenting the thẩm tra report on the above draft Law, Member of the Party Central Committee, Chairman of the Law and Justice Committee (UBPLTP) Phan Chi Hieu said that the UBPLTP agreed with the necessity and scope of amendments and supplements of the draft Law.
Regarding customs inspection and supervision of exported and imported goods through e-commerce platforms, the majority of opinions in the UBPLTP agreed with the regulation requiring organizations and individuals in Vietnam when buying and selling goods with foreign countries through e-commerce platforms to carry out electronic identification verification.
At the same time, the UBPLTP proposed that the drafting agency study regulations in the direction that electronic ID verification is only carried out once for each account and is used uniformly for transactions arising on that account, ensuring convenience for users and management efficiency.
Regarding customs inspection, the UBPLTP proposed to stipulate in the Law a number of specific bases to determine goods that need inspection, the responsibility of customs authorities in fully considering the assessment results, issuing the final notice, and on that basis assigning the Government to provide detailed regulations.
The UBPLTP also proposed to clarify the content of "technical criteria" and the relationship between this activity and product and goods quality inspection activities according to the provisions of specialized laws; at the same time, clarify the basis, methods, scope, stages of application of inspection, procedures, legal value of inspection results, re-evaluation results, supplementary evaluation results...
Regarding risk management and compliance management, the UBPLTP assessed that some contents between regulations on risk management and compliance management still have duplication, therefore, it is proposed that the drafting agency continue to review and clarify the specific nature of each professional activity; at the same time, supplement regulations on the responsibility of customs authorities in verifying assessment results and mechanisms for customs declarants to explain and complain when there is evidence that the assessment results are inaccurate.
Regarding customs procedure agents, the UBPLTP agrees with amending regulations on customs procedure agents in the direction of abolishing investment and business conditions, in accordance with the Investment Law and the policy of administrative procedure reform.
However, the UBPLTP believes that the regulation assigning the Minister of Finance to regulate standards and manage the operations of customs procedure agents and customs procedure agent staff does not clearly reflect the viewpoint of management by system connection, supervision and post-inspection.
Therefore, the UBPLTP proposes to consider regulations in the direction that based on the regulations of the Minister of Finance promulgating standards and technical regulations for agents carrying out customs procedures and agents staff carrying out customs procedures, competent authorities will develop processes and procedures for management to improve the quality and efficiency of post-inspection work.
If passed, this Law is expected to take effect from March 1, 2027.
