ASEAN Customs Transit System ACTS - Parallel Run

Summary Report of Activities and Results

Period: 16 January to 3 February 2017
1. Background

1.1 The ACTS Parallel Run, phase B of the ACTS Pilot, is a

collaborative effort involving the Customs Authorities and traders
(Principals) of participating ASEAN Member States (Malaysia,
Singapore and Thailand), the Regional ACTS Project Manager, the
ACTS Implementation Team and ARISE.

1.2 The Parallel Run started on 16 January 2017 with a series of

planning and strategy meetings held in the ASEAN Secretariat.
These meetings followed a three-day training event for the
private sector to prepare for the Parallel Run, held in Bangkok
from 10-12 January 2017. During this event the outline plans for
the Parallel Run were agreed with the participating traders, and
an outline schedule was developed and agreed. This is shown at
annex A to this report.

1.3 The objective is to run genuine transactions to and from

participating AMS, and to capture ACTS data in parallel. This will
act as a real life trial of the system, to identify any issues that
may need to be addressed in the ACTS procedural or technical
environment.

1.4 The relevant documents prepared by ARISE for this phase

are:
1.4.1 ACTS Parallel Run Planning and Pre-requisites; and
1.4.2 Report of Training for the Private Sector in Preparation for
the ACTS Parallel Run.

1.5 The private sector participating Principals are:

No Co Trader Name
. unt
ry
1 SG DHL Global Forwarding (Singapore) Pte
Limited
2 SG Yamato Asia Pte Limited / GD Express
(Singapore)
3 SG YCH Group
1 TH NMB-MINEBEA Thai Limited
2 TH CTI Logistic Company Limited
3 TH Logistics One Company Limited
4 TH AMARIT and Associates Company Limited

2. Activities and Results

2.1 Starting from 1st February 2017 the participating private
sector traders submitted a series of trial transit declarations. The
issues arising from these trials have been logged and are shown
at annex B to this report.

2.2 On 27 January 2017 a Thai company Logistics One Co. Ltd.

submitted the first declaration to ACTS under the Parallel Run.
This transaction was allocated ACTS Reference Number (ARN)
A17TH0000000000210, scheduled to depart from Sadao, Thailand
on 31 January 2017.

2.3 The transaction was successfully processed by Thai

Customs at departure from Sadao Customs House, the NCF
(notification of crossing frontier) message was processed at
Sadao Transit Office and the consignment crossed the border to
Malaysia.

2.4 In anticipation of the arrival of the truck in Malaysia, ARISE

had notified Royal Malaysia Customs (RMC) in advance, so they
they could be ready to process the consignment. RMC actually
processed the consignment in advance of its release from Thai
Customs, and this rightly triggered a warning as the NCF had not
yet been transmitted to RMC, upon which processing by RMC of
the transaction was stopped at Bukit Kayu Hitam. (In normal
circumstances it would not be possible to process ACTS
consignments early, as the process would start with the driver
presenting the TAD to the office of transit.)

2.5 The transaction continued normally to the outward transit

office from Malaysia and successfully reached Tuas in Singapore,
where the NCF (notification crossing frontier) was registered by
Singapore Customs. Singapore Customs continued with the
registration of the Arrival Notification and clearance at
destination. As a result the ACTS transit movement was correctly
written off in the Thai Office if Departure, Sadao Customs House.

2.6 On 1 February 2017 a second transaction was submitted by

CTI Logistics Co. Ltd. as a broker for NMB-Minebea Thai Ltd. This
transaction was processed at departure by Thai Customs at
Sadao Customs House under ARN A17TH0000000000229, and the
NCF processed at Sadao Transit Office. The consignment crossed
the border to Malaysia at Bukit Kayu HItam on 1 st February 2017.
The movement was not however processed in ACTS by RMC and
Singapore Customs. The most probable reason was that the driver
did not present the TAD to the respective Customs Authorities
grateful CTI could kindly confirm to ARISE please.
2.7 Normally this should trigger an enquiry process, and if that
does not produce results, a recovery process. In the event, the
enquiry and recovery timers were triggered sooner than
expected. There is no turning back from the status of recovery
recommended, so we were unable to recommend normal enquiry
procedures to be carried out on this occasion. ARISE and the
ACTS Implementation Team will propose the length of time
needed for the automatic two timers for enquiry and recovery
action recommended to be taken.

3. Lessons Learned
3.1 The following issues arose and are being addressed as
indicated:

For the first transaction under ARN A17TH0000000000210,

ACTS allowed the trader to print a form of pre-TAD (Transit
Accompanying Document). This showed an incorrect date of
release (this field box 9 should be blank on a Pre-TAD) and did
not carry a watermark as Draft or Office Copy to identify that
it was a pre-TAD and not the genuine TAD printed by Customs at
departure under normal procedures. Intrasoft have logged this
as an issue and will resolve it (JIRA issue: ACTSMAINT-42);

The item declared appeared to be part of a larger consignment;

this was accepted, so as not to delay the movement of the
genuine consignment;

Although this was normal procedure, it was accepted that the

trader seals shown could be accepted as declared and printed in
box 41 normally trader seals are only authorised for use by
Authorised Transit Traders (ATT); the pace in box 41 does not
have much scope for more than two seals, Intrasoft have been
requested to research of more space can be made available to
show the identities of multiple seals in box 41 of the TAD;

For this transaction the declared transit office of exit from

Malaysia was Tanjung Pelepas at Johor, which is not on the
agreed pilot transit route. RMC queried this as the agreed ACTS
transit office at the southern border of Malaysia is Tanjung
Kupang, leading to Tuas in Singapore. Proposed Solution:
RMC to adjust office roles in the Customs Office code list held in
the Reference Data System to reflect permitted transit offices as
Bukit Kayu Hitam and Tanjung Kupang, so that other offices will
be blocked if declared in error during the Parallel Run;

The trader accidentally omitted to declare a dummy ASEAN

Goods Vehicle Cross Border Permit number. It has been
proposed to make this a mandatory field at general level in the
ACTS declaration;
 Royal Malaysian Customs submitted the following change request:
It is difficult to monitor incoming messages in the National Transit
Application (NTA) by having to search and filter various states in
order to see if there is a movement to be expected. We propose
that the home page of the NTA is similar to the Trader Portal. That
is, this page should show all incoming messages for this specific
Customs office. Ideally, the home page would have an auto-refresh
capability so that it can be used as a "Live" dashboard where
customs can monitor messages that have been received for a
specific customs office. A set of filtering criteria would also be
useful. For example at the border office (transit office) we are not
aware of the ATR records we have received unless we search for
specific status. The dashboard will aid us to increase efficiency and
proactively do our work.

Following the triggering of the recovery recommended timer for

transaction ARN A17TH0000000000229, ARISE and the ACTS
Implementation Team will recommend the settings for the two
automatic ACTS timers, enquiry and recovery.

4. Conclusion

4.1 This initial period of the Parallel Run provided an

encouraging start to phase B of the ACTS Pilot. The cooperation
of all involved is much appreciated, in particular the private
sector and the Customs Authorities of participating Member
States. In this context the prospects are good for a successful
conclusion of this phase of the ACTS Pilot.

***
Annex A Outline Schedule & Log of Results
Day Name of ACTS Date at Dates at Date at Comments
Principal Procedures Departur Transit Destinati
(Normal/Simpli e on
fied)
1st Logistics Normal 1-Feb-17 1-Feb- 2-Feb- ARN A17TH0000000000210
One from 2017 2017 NCF not processed at Bukit (see above).
Sadao Bukit Kayu Consignment reached Singapore,
Hitam movement written off at Sadao.
1st NMB- Normal 1-Feb-17 2-Feb- ARN: A17TH0000000000229
MINEBEA from 2017 Timer triggered, recovery recommended.
Thai Ltd. Sadao Enquiry and recovery timers
and CTI recommended for adjustment.
Logistics
2nd YCH Normal 3-Feb-17 Delayed to 7-8 February 2017 to allow
from for resolution of system issues
Singapor
e
3rd DHL Normal TBC from
Singapor
e
4th Yamato Normal TBC from
Singapor
e
5th AMARIT and Normal TBC from
Associates Sadao
Co.
Later days to be confirmed
15th Normal
16th Simplified
..
Day Name of ACTS Date at Dates at Date at Comments
Principal Procedures Departur Transit Destinati
(Normal/Simpli e on
fied)
30th Simplified
Annex B Log of Issues Arising in ACTS Parallel Run
No Issue Description Initial JIRA Apps Resoluti Status Maintena Priorit
. Positio Issue involv on Party nce type y
n ID ed (-ies)
1 Trader Logistics One has submitted a 'pre-TAD' JIRA to NTA, TP Intrasoft Open CORRECTIVE Low
for the Parallel Run showing date of release for be
transit as 27 January 2017 and proposed date register
of departure from Sadao, Thailand as 31 ed for
January 2017. In fact this consignment has Intrasoft
not been released, so the appearance of this
date in box 9 of TAD appears incorrect. This
needs to be investigated. The correct release
date should be generated by the ACTS system
and shown in box 9 of the TAD. If the TAD is a
pre-TAD, then this field should be empty.
2 For the first transaction under ARN Intrasoft ACTSM NTA, TP Intrasoft Open CORRECTIVE Medium
A17TH0000000000210, ACTS allowed the AINT-
trader to print a form of pre-TAD (Transit 42
Accompanying Document). This showed
an incorrect date of release (this field box
9 should be blank on a Pre-TAD) and did
not carry a watermark as Draft or Office
Copy to identify that it was a pre-TAD
and not the genuine TAD printed by
Customs at departure under normal
procedures. Intrasoft have logged this as
an issue and will resolve it.
3 Need to delete KGM from the list of ARISE RDS ARISE Open PREVENTIVE Low
supplementary units, by updating a code-list in
RDS
4 Box 41 of TAD shows one seal number with a JIRA to NTA, TP Intrasoft/ Open EVOLUTIVE Low
partial second seal number. Research needed be ARISE
to see if the box can be expanded to hold say 4 register
seal identities ed for
Intrasoft
5 It seems that the watermarks are not produced JIRA to NTA, TP Intrasoft Open CORRECTIVE Low
correctly in various versions of TAD be
register
ed for
Intrasoft
6 Propose to ASEAN Member States to amend ARISE / RDS ARISE Open PREVENTIVE Low
office roles in Customs Office Code List to AMS
reflect agreed Parallel Run office of departure,
transit and destination, and to block accidental
usage un-authorised offices
7 Propose the ASEAN Goods Vehicle Cross Border JIRA to NTA, TP Intrasoft/ Open EVOLUTIVE Low
Permit should be mandatory at general level in be ARISE
an ACTS declaration register
ed for
Intrasoft
8 Royal Malaysian Customs reported the JIRA to NTA, TP Intrasoft Open EVOLUTIVE Medium
following change request: be
It is difficult to monitor incoming messages register
ed for
in the National Transit Application (NTA) by
Intrasoft
having to search and filter various states in
order to see if there is a movement to be
expected. We propose that the home page
of the NTA is similar to the Trader Portal.
That is, this page should show all incoming
messages for this specific customs office.
Ideally, the home page would have an
auto-refresh capability so that it can be
used as a "Live" dashboard where customs
 can monitor messages that have been
received for a specific customs office. A set
of filtering criteria would also be useful. For
example at the border office (transit office)
we are not aware of the ATR records we
have received unless we search for specific
status. The dashboard will aid us to
increase efficiency and proactively do our
work.

9 The automatic timers for enquiry and ARISE / NTA ARISE / Open EVOLUTIVE Medium
recovery appear to be set at periods that Intrasoft Intrasoft
are too short. ARISE to recommend
adjustment of the timer settings, Intrasoft
to provide guidance if necessary to AMS in
adjustment process.