In a recent post we discussed why auditing EEI filings is a good business practice. If you are a self filer is anyone checking the accuracy of your submissions? Does your freight forwarder have an audit procedure in place if they are filing for you? Here is the risk of a “file it and forget it” policy:

15 CFR 30.71

(a) Criminal penalties—(1) Failure to file; submission of false or misleading information. Any person, including USPPIs, authorized agents or carriers, who knowingly fails to file or knowingly submits, directly or indirectly, to the U.S. Government, false or misleading export information through the AES, shall be subject to a fine not to exceed $10,000 or imprisonment for not more than five years, or both, for each violation.

EEI filing has become routine for exporters and their agents and it is easy to overlook possible filing errors. Here are a few mandatory EEI Elements to check in your audits:

15 CFR 30.6

(4) U.S. state of origin. The U.S. state of origin is the 2-character postal code for the state in which the goods begin their journey to the port of export. For example, a shipment covering goods laden aboard a truck at a warehouse in Georgia for transport to Florida for loading onto a vessel for export to a foreign country shall show Georgia as the state of origin. The U.S. state of origin may be different from the U.S. state where the goods were produced, mined, or grown. For shipments of multi-state origin, reported as a single shipment, report the U.S. state of the commodity with the greatest value. If such information is not known, report the state in which the commodities are consolidated for export.

(5) Country of ultimate destination.

(ii) Shipments not moving under an export license. The country of ultimate destination is the country known to the USPPI or U.S. authorized agent at the time of exportation. The country to which the goods are being shipped is not the country of ultimate destination if the USPPI or U.S. authorized agent has knowledge, at the time the goods leave the United States, that they are intended for reexport or transshipment in the form received to another known country. For goods shipped to Canada, Mexico, Panama, Hong Kong, Belgium, United Arab Emirates, The Netherlands, or Singapore, special care should be exercised before reporting these countries as the ultimate destinations because these are countries through which goods from the United States are frequently transshipped. If the USPPI or U.S. authorized agent does not know the ultimate destination of the goods, the country of ultimate destination to be shown is the last country, as known to the USPPI or U.S. authorized agent at the time the goods leave the United States, to which the goods are to be shipped in their present form. (For instructions as to the reporting of country of ultimate destination for vessels sold or transferred from the United States to foreign ownership, see § 30.26). In addition, the following types of shipments must be reported as follows:

Note: EEI value is not necessarily the same as Commercial Invoice value.

(17) Value. In general, the value to be reported in the EEI shall be the value of the goods at the U.S. port of export in U.S. dollars. The value shall be the selling price (or the cost, if the goods are not sold), plus inland or domestic freight, insurance, and other charges to the U.S. seaport, airport, or land border port of export. Cost of goods is the sum of expenses incurred in the USPPI’s acquisition or production of the goods. Report the value to the nearest dollar, omit cents. Fractions of a dollar less than 50 cents should be ignored, and fractions of 50 cents or more should be rounded up to the next dollar.

Contact mitch@adhoclogistics.com for help with EEI audits.