Customs

Import compliance can be a challenge to businesses operating in the global environment. Importation issues include the entry process, tariff classification, valuation, country of origin, free trade agreement eligibility, duty deferral possibilities, and additional costs or restrictions arising from trade remedy actions. Adding to these import challenges is an intensifying trade enforcement environment and constantly evolving legal landscape. Failure to recognize and adapt to this environment can cause disruptions in your business’s global supply chain and expose your company to substantial unexpected duties and monetary penalties.

We help clients identify issues, assess risks, structure transactions, make sourcing decisions, and utilize duty savings programs. We provide effective and creative counseling to clients in audits, enforcement actions, and administrative proceedings conducted by CBP and in litigation before the U.S. Court of International Trade and Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Our lawyers deliver sophisticated and practical advice to clients in a broad range of industries, including steel, automobiles and parts, chemical, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, food, textiles and apparel, aerospace, green energy, and office products. We also offer a nationally renowned U.S. customs broker licensing examination preparation class, which for more than 20 years has prepared hundreds of students all over the country.

Our customs practice focuses on the U.S., but working with trusted friends and colleagues with whom we have a long history, we have assisted clients on customs matters globally, including in Canada, Mexico, Brazil, EU countries, Russia, China, and Japan. Additionally, U.S. customs problems often involve other agencies such as the FDA or EPA, and in those cases we work with Alston & Bird lawyers dedicated to those regulatory areas.

• Litigated against prior certification for duty-free imports under the WTO Civil Aircraft Agreement and authored the U.S. tariff schedule note on imports of civil aircraft and parts.
• Obtained a short supply treatment of textile articles under NAFTA, CAFTA, and trade preference programs covering sub-Saharan Africa, Caribbean, and Andean countries.
• Represented a U.S. importer in the investigation of a radioactive contamination event.
• Represented a U.S. exporter in obtaining duty-free treatment under the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS) for imports into South Korea.
• Represented a U.S. exporter in a NAFTA audit conducted by Mexican customs.
• Represented a U.S. exporter and its Canadian affiliate in connection with a prior disclosure of incorrect NAFTA claims to the Canada Border Services Agency.
• Represented a U.S. importer challenging CBP’s reclassification of a machine, obtaining further review by CBP headquarters and reversing the port decision.
• Represented a client’s Chinese affiliate in a review of its Chinese bonded warehouse operations and tariff classifications.
• Represented multiple clients in prior disclosures to correct misclassification, undervaluation, or the failure to declare imports as subject to antidumping and countervailing duties, avoiding penalties and enforcement actions.
• Represented a global fine chemicals company in a customs protest challenging CBP’s rejection of the company’s use of transaction value and its liquidation of entries at a value twice as high as the declared value. We secured a favorable ruling with Customs headquarters rejecting the port’s increase in the dutiable value and won the right for the client to use the “first sale” doctrine, resulting in lower dutiable values for its imported agrichemicals than the client originally declared and refunds.
• Represented a leading global supplier of technologies for the automotive industry in a voluntary disclosure to CBP in connection with the importation of aluminum parts. We guided the client through parallel scope proceedings and administrative reviews, which significantly reduced the amount of antidumping and countervailing duties owed by the company on the aluminum imports, and eventually closed the disclosure without penalties.
• Represented one of the largest apparel producers in the world in a CBP Focused Assessment.
• Represented an industry group in assisting governmental authorities in a General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) dispute.
• Assisted a foreign government in a World Customs Organization classification proceeding.