Customs disputes and issues legal adviser
Enterprises – importers, often face unreasonable decisions of the customs to change the code of goods imported into the territory of Ukraine. It is necessary to pay special attention to the fact that the customs has the right to change the product code not only during the customs clearance process, but also after the goods (vehicle) have been cleared. As a rule, a change in the product code occurs to the code that provides for the payment of a larger amount of customs fee.
Such decisions of the customs authority has to be appealed. You can act in two directions: administrative appeal and judicial. Recently, the administrative appeal has become quite effective. The customs can independently reverse their unreasonable decisions. Of course, such cases are not as frequent as we would like, so rather success can be achieved in court.
However, you need to understand that the judges are not experts in determining the exact product code, so it is better not to waste time and immediately declare a forensic examination, which will help determine the applicable product code.
It should also not be forgotten that if the declaring entity defines a product code that provides for the payment of a lower amount of duties, then customs officials as a rule regard such actions of the declaring entity as deliberate evasion of customs duties and draw up protocols on administrative offenses under Article 485 of the Customs Code. The result of prosecution under this article will be a fine of up to 300% of the unpaid amount of customs payments.
Also, customs officials can draw up a protocol under Art. 472 of the Customs Code, justifying this by the fact that the declaring entity indicated inaccurate (unreliable) data on the goods. In this case, confiscation of the goods and a penalty of 100% of the value of the goods will be applied to the declaring entity.
When the customs office draws up a protocol on an administrative offense related to the incorrect determination of the product code, there is no need to wait for a court decision to appeal the classification decision of the customs authority. Such a trial can last for a long period time, and the protocols must be appealed immediately, since the term for bringing to justice under the protocol on an administrative offense is 6 months from the date the customs authority detects the offense.
