Government of India
Ministry of Finance
Department of Revenue
Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs
To,
Principal Chief Commissioners / Chief Commissioners / Principal Commissioners / Commissioners of Customs
Subject: Electronic sealing - Deposit in and removal of goods from Customs bonded Warehouses-reg.
The Warehouse (Custody & Handling of Goods) Regulations, 2016, the Special Warehouse (Custody & Handling of Goods) Regulations, 2016, Warehoused Goods (Removal) Regulations 2016, Manufacture and Other Operations in Warehouse (no. 2) Regulations, 2019 and circular 17/2016-Cus prescribe the affixation of a one-time-lock for transport of goods to be deposited in a warehouse or removed therefrom.
2. The regulations require that goods arriving at the warehouse from a customs station shall be affixed with a one-time-lock with its serial number endorsed upon the bill of entry for warehousing and the transport document. The warehouse keeper or bond officer, as the case may be, is required to inspect the seal and when it is found intact, permit the goods to be unloaded at the warehouse. Circular 17/2016-Cus dated 14th May 2016 prescribes that in case of removal of goods from a customs station for deposit into a warehouse, the container or means of transport (closed trucks) should be affixed with a one-time-lock by the proper officer at the customs station. A similar procedure has been provided under the Warehoused Good (Removal) Regulations, 2016, for removal of warehoused goods from one warehouse to another and from a warehouse to customs station for export and also the Manufacture and Other Operations in Warehouse (no. 2) Regulations, 2019. Also, the Principal Commissioner of Customs /Commissioner of Customs is duly empowered to permit movement of goods without affixation of OTLs, where the nature of goods or their manner of transport so warrant (e.g. Liquid Bulk Cargo transported through Pipe Lines and Over Dimensional Cargo).
3. Subsequently, the Board has prescribed RFID self-sealing for export of containerized cargo. Circulars 36/2017, 37/2017 and 41/2017 - Customs prescribe the use of "RFID tamper proof one-time-bolt seal" and providing of readers / procedure for its use by Customs. It has now been decided by the Board that RFID sealing shall be extended to transport of goods for deposit in a warehouse as well as removal therefrom. Therefore, where ever the Warehousing Regulations (referred in para 1 above) prescribe affixing of a "One Time Lock", the importer or owner of the goods shall use RFID anti-tamper one-time-locks (hereinafter referred as "RFID OTL").
4. The RFID OTLs shall be sourced from the vendors whose names appear in the list placed on the website of the CBIC (please see weblink alongside to circular 36 & 37/2017 on www.cbic.gov.in)
4.1 Considering the fact that goods may be removed through a variety of vehicles, different types of RFID OTLs, such as bolt seals (already specified by circular 36/2017-Cus) or wire - cable seal shall be used. The specifications, data elements and procedure to be used under the Regulations for Warehousing shall be as follows:
4.2 Seals
(i) For containers (RFID One-Time-Bolt Seal)
As prescribed under circular 36/2017 - Customs dated 28th August 2017
(ii) For closed body vehicles (RFID Wire Cable seal)
(a) Each seal shall be a one-time-lock bearing a unique serial number and brand of the vendor in the format ABCD XXXX XXXX, where ABCD stands for the brand of the vendor and X (8 digit) is a numerical digit from 0-9.
(b) The RFID seal shall conform to ISO 17712:2013 and ISO/IEC 18000-6 Class 1 Gen 2 which is globally accepted in industrial applications and can be read with the use of UHF (i.e. 860 MHz to 960 MHz) Reader-Scanners.
(c) The manufacturer or vendor, as the case may be, shall be in possession of certifications required for conformance of the ISO standard ISO 17712:2013 namely, clauses 4, 5 and 6 (as applicable to cable-wire seals)
(d) Before commencement of sales, the vendor shall submit self-certified copies of the above certifications to the Risk Management Division (RMD).
4.3 Readers
The specification of Readers to be deployed shall be as prescribed under circular 41/2017 - Customs dated 30.10.2017.
4.4 Software & Application
(a) The data elements to be captured in the web-application in the case of removal goods from a customs station to a bonded warehouse shall be as follows:-
(i) IEC (Importer Exporter Code)
(ii) Bill of Entry Number.
(iii) Date
(iv) RFID OTL number
(v) Date of sealing
(vi) Time of sealing
(vii) Container Number (where cargo is containerized or else not required)
(viii) Registration number of vehicle
(ix) Warehouse code
(x) Customs location code
(b) The data elements to be captured in the web-application in the case of removal goods from a warehouse to a customs station for export shall be as follows:-
(ii) Shipping Bill Number.
(ix) Customs location code
(x) Warehouse code
(c) The data elements to be captured in the web-application in the case of removal goods from a warehouse to another warehouse (section 67):-
(ii) Bill of Entry No.
(iv) Warehouse code (origin)
(v) Warehouse code (destination)
(vi) RFID OTL number
(vii) Date of sealing
(viii) Time of sealing
(ix) Container Number (where cargo is containerized or else not required)
(x) Registration number of vehicle
4.5 Procedure
(a) All licensees of customs bonded warehouses shall have to procure Readers for scanning of RFID OTLs at the bonded warehouse at their own cost.
(b) The licensee shall also procure RFID OTLs from the vendors for providing the same to importer, owner, exporter or in case of private bonded warehouses for their own use. It is clarified that licensees are free to procure RFID OTLs from any one or more vendors.
(c) The vendors shall be required to provide Readers to Customs locations. Readers already deployed by vendors to Ports and ICDs for RFID sealing can also be used for this procedure. Air Cargo Complexes, CFS and LCSs are also covered under this procedure for transport of bonded goods.
(d) Any importer permitted to remove goods for deposit in a warehouse shall obtain an RFID seal from the Warehouse where the goods are to be deposited.
Provided that for warehouse to warehouse transfer the owner of the goods shall procure a RFID seal from the destination warehouse.
(e) Vendors shall ensure that the TID number is captured in their data base and warehouse code of the licensee is linked to the same at the time of sale of seals.
(f) Vendors shall ensure that data can be uploaded from internet enabled Readers as well as desktops.
(g) Circular No 19/2016- Cus dated 20th May 2016 prescribes that the importer shall declare the warehouse code in the Bill of Entry for warehousing. The Out of Charge officer releasing the cargo for deposit in a warehouse is advised to match the warehouse code declared in the bill of entry with that linked to the seal. This procedure shall dispense the need for securing any space availability certificates by importers.
(h) The exporter of warehoused goods will be obligated to declare the physical serial number of the RFID OTL at the time of filing the online integrated shipping bill or in the case of manual shipping bill, before the container or cargo is dispatched from the warehouse.
(i) In case the RFID OTT is found to be tampered at the Customs Station at the time of export, then mandatory examination would be carried out by the Customs authorities.
(j) In case at the time of arrival of the goods at the warehouse, the RFID OTL is found to be tampered, then the licensee shall not permit unloading of the goods and shall inform the bond officer [Please refer sub-regulation 5(1) and (7) of the Warehouse Custody & Handling of Goods) Regulation, 2016 and Regulation 10(l)(ii) and 11 (ii) of Manufacture and Other Operations in Warehouse (no. 2) Regulations, 2019],
(k) Under Regulation (5) of the Warehoused Goods (Removal) Regulations 2016, and Regulation 10 of Manufacture and Other Operations in Warehouse (no. 2) Regulations, 2019, the importer or owner is required to produce an acknowledgement of the due arrival of the goods. With the introduction of the procedure contained in this circular, the "trip report" generated by scanning the RFID OTL at the destination customs station or warehouse, shall be printed and retained for records by the customs station, bond officer and licensee. This will enable discharge of the requirement of acknowledgement enjoined under the aforesaid Regulation (5) and Regulation 10 of the respective Regulations.
(l) For the purposes of risk management, if there is any inordinate delay in the due arrival of goods, the bond officer may be alerted by the customs station or vice versa.
(m) Where any procedure requires that goods removed from a warehouse shall move under physical escort by customs (e.g. as prescribed by circular 32/2016 regarding Duty Free Shops), the use of RFID OTL shall not apply.
5. The Principal Commissioner of Customs /Commissioner of Customs is duly empowered to permit movement of goods without affixation of RFID OTLs, where the nature of goods or their manner of transport so warrant (e.g. Liquid Bulk Cargo transported through Pipe Lines and Over Dimensional Cargo).
6. The above procedure shall come into force with effect from 15th March, 2020.
7. Clarifications, if any, may be sought from the Board.
8. Hindi version follows.
(Dr. Swati Bhanwala)
OSD (Land Customs))