Global Trade Management solutions provider, JP Morgan Chase Vastera, www.jpmorganchase.com, calls attention to the latest World Customs Organization’s Harmonized Tariff System (HTS) at the international level—6-digit sub-headings—will go into effect in the new year. The provider expects to reclassify more than 700,000 components for its customers by the end of this year.
Companies that don’t update their HTS face the risks of bottlenecks in their supply chains, the possibilities of sanctions and duty increases that may not have been anticipated. Every five years HTS classifications are updated. This time of the 97 HTS chapters, some 83 have been revised.
“In previous HTS updates the changes were typically minor or involved an entire classification,” notes Bernie Hart, global product executive at JPMorgan Chase Vastera. “This allowed for ‘one-on-one mapping’ when updating of HTS classifications. However, ‘one-on-one mapping’ will not always be possible with the new changes. Most importers and exporters will need to review each material and good to determine the appropriate classification. For an organization with 5,000 parts, such a review is a significant burden. For an organization with 50,000 parts or more—that’s a nightmare.”
