CUSTOMS  FACULTIES

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CUSTOMS FACULTIES
  1. CUSTOMS, as the Active Party of Customs Tax Obligations, has the faculties of: 
    • Determination
    • Collection
    • Supervision and enforcement of Customs Tax Obligations
    • Control of duties and taxes
    • Issuing punitive measures
    • Collecting by legal coaction

Article 10º of the Regulations of the General Customs Law (D.S. Nº 121-96-EF).

In Customs Tax Obligations, the active party that intervenes as the tax creditor is CUSTOMS, and the passive party in the condition of debtor is the tax payer or contributor responsible. 

CUSTOMS DUES OR PAYABLE DUTY
  1. The Customs Dues or Payable Duty is understood to be the amount resulting from the tally of duties, interests, fines, costs that constitute obligatory payment. This also includes the additional charges incurred prior to the enactment of the General Customs Law - D. Leg. Nº 809.

INITIATION OF DUTY OBLIGATIONS:

  1. In imports and postal traffic, the Customs Tax Obligation initiates at the date that the Customs Declaration is numbered; in the transfer of goods from special duty zones to common duty zones, the obligation initiates at the date the request for transfer is filed, as it also does in the transfer of goods that entered with tax exemption.
  2. The tariff duties and other taxes to be applied will be those in force on the date the Customs Tax Obligation is initiated.  

TAX DEBTOR

In the Customs Tax Obligation, the Passive Party is the debtor, tax contributor or person responsible. The tax payer or contributor is considered to be the owner or consignee of the goods. 

Determination of the Debt
    1. All units of CUSTOMS are under obligation to promote, within their area of operations, the collection of customs dues when they are aware of an infraction or a situation leading to an infraction, and have identified the Passive Party responsible for the Customs Dues. 
    2. The Determining Documents are the following:
    1. The Auto-assessment of Duties Payable or Customs Liquidations of Declarations: These determine the dues payable that are originated by the numbering of the Customs Declarations. 
    2. Resolutions of Determination: These determine the dues payable that are originated as a result of the revision of goods clearance documents or documents that are presented by the transport company, or from inspection visits made to the homes of customs agents or foreign trade operators, or through any other administrative act.   
    3. Resolutions of Fines: These determine the dues payable that are generated by the findings of an infraction before it is fully committed and is given an administrative sanction with a fine.   

Registry of Duties Payable

Through Notifications of Duties Payable, authorized personnel register all the dues payable that are originated within the responsibilities pertaining to CUSTOMS, with the exception of dues payable inclded in the Declarations Clearances and those originated by the payment for services provided or for sales by CUSTOMS. 

Notification of Duties Payable
    1. The Notifications of Duties Payable are documents on the registry, control and paymentof the dues payable. 
    2. The National Customs Intendencies, through the operations areas that determine the dues payable, are to issue the correspondingNotificationof Duties Payable and Notification Orders. 
    3. The Collection Areas of the Customs Intendencies are authorized to issue  Liquidaciones de Cobranza and their notifications when other customs offices do not have the particular department to issue such documents. 
    4. Las Notification of Duties Payable issued by each Customs Intendency will be assigned a unique numbering system given automatically and in correlation by the central System.
    5. One or more Notification of Duties Payable if needed, can be issued for each Determination Document, according to the procedure established for that purpose.  

Notification of the Duties Payable

    1. Once the Determination Document and the Notification of Duties Payable have been completed, the Area that issues the documents or the Area of Documentary Procedures notifies the interested parties (Passive Party) with copies of the documents, according to the regulations outlined in  Arts. 11, 103, 104, 105 and 106 of the Tax Code, via the corresponding Notification Order.  

      2. When the process of clearing the goods is carried out by a Customs Agent or through an International Courier Company, only these persons are notified of the Determination Document.  If after three (03) days from the notification the duties have not been paid, the principal debtor is notified of the Document.  

      When the report includes additional Charges, a copy of these must be attached at the time of notification. If the Charge is the result of an adjustment in the value of the goods, the document must indicate the references used to arrive at the result. 

      In the case of  Customs Collection of non-Customs Taxes, a Notification Order is unnecessary, as is the proof of receipt of the Notification of Taxes Payable. 

    2. The notification, to the representatives of the persons indicated in Nos. 2, 3, and 4 of Art. 16, and of Art. 17 of the Tax Code, who were acting in representation at the time the customs tax obligation was generated, will be presented according to the procedure established for those responsible. 

    3. Contents of the Notification Order:
    1. Intendency that issues the notification and its address
    2. Customs Area that issues the order
    3. Name or company to be notified, and address
    4. Number of Determination Document and of Notification of Duties Payable
    5. The amount of the debt payable, and indication of interests to be charge if this is applicable
    6. The period of week days permitted for the payment of the debt, whether it applies to administrative charges or duties
    1. Proof of Receipt of Notification: must include the following minimum information, indicated legibly:

a) In the case of an individual person:

    • Full name and surnames of the person receiving the document
    • National Identity or Electoral Registration Number
    • Signature
    • Date when received
    • Relationship to the debtor or interested party

b) In the case of a company:

    • Full name and surnames of the person reciving the document 
    • National Identity or Electoral Registration Number
    • Signature
    • Job position in the company
    • Seal of the debtor company
    • Date when received
    1. In the case that the order is not received, the person responsible for presenting the notification order will certify this and provide the following information: 
    1. Date and time of notification
    2. Name and surnames of notifier
    3. Ntional Identity or Electoral Registration Numberof notifier
    4. Full name of company or person to be notified
    5. Address of the person indicated in (d)
    6. Details of the notification order
    7. Detailed description of the locale where the notification should be presented (e.g. place, color of building, number of floors, doors and windows in front entrance).
    8. Signature of notifier

The notifier will also affix the notification to the main door of the legal address and document this in the above report. 

Payment

Place of Payment

The payment of dues payable can be made at banking institutions authorized by CUSTOMS through service contracts, or at the Customs Intendencies when applicable. 

Form of Payment
    1. The payment will be paid in cash before release of the goods, except in cases permitted otherwise by law. 
    2. Any debt generated after the release of the goods will be paid as above where applicable. 
    3. Payment will be made in local currency. For dues payable that are expressed in US Dollars, the average selling exchange rate published by the Banking and Insurance Superintendency on the day of payment will be used. 

Means of Payment
    1. The duties will be paid in cash, charged against current or savings accounts, by certified or banker's checks, simple checks, Negotiable Credit Notes or other means that are permitted by law. 
    2. CUSTOMS will accept the payment through charges against current or savings accounts if prior conditions are met as indicated by a National Customs Superintendency Resolution.  
    3. CUSTOMS can demand in certain cases that the payment be made only by cash or by certified or banker's checks.
    4. Bond or Stock Certificates can be used as partial or total payment of the debt, issued and governed by the legal regulations. The bond papers to be used for payment of debts include, among others: 
    1. Negotiable Notes of Credit, issued by CUSTOMS or SUNAT, the tax authority
    2. Cancellation Documents from the Public Treasury
    3. Tax Compensation Certificates

Payment wth these documents can be made only at the CUSTOMS cashiers and according to procedures governing Valued Documents 

Deadline for Payment

  1. The deadline for payment, counted in week days, is as follows: 

    1. Resolution of Determination or Charge, and Fine Resolution: within ten (10) days following the notification. 
    2. Accounts Summary of Customs Declarations (DUAs), and Rejected Checks: three (03) days as of the day following the DUI numbering, and the notification of the rejection, respectively. 
    3. In the case of Advance Clearance System: the same day as the numbering of the Declaration. 
    4. Auto-estimates of payment: The day of its numbering.

Payments after Deadline

    1. The payment of a debt after the deadline generates interest charged on delay. 
    2. Fines pending payment over the deadline, placed on the procedure as per Legislative Decree 809, will be subject to the payment of delay interest as from the date the infraction was committed, or when this is not able to be established, from the date CUSTOMS detected the anomalys to the date the fines are paid. 
    3. The procedure to apply these delay interests is determined according to the procedures for Notification of Dues Payable

Extinction of the tax obligation

The tax obligation is extinguished through measures provided in the General Customs Law and the Tax Code, according to Specific and Instructive Procedures laid out by the National Intendency of Customs Collection.                                                                                       

Injunction of Customs Debt

  1. The customs debt is liable to demand:

    1. As of the eleventh day following the notification, in the case of Determination or Charge Resolutions and Fine Resolutions. 
    2. As of the fourth week day following the numbering of the document, in the case of Clearance of Customs Declaration (DUI), except for those cases foreseen by the Law. 
    3. In the cases subject to the Advanced Customs Clearance System, from the time the Declaration is numbered. 
  1. If the deadline is not met and the debtor has not filed a claim prior to the deadline and the taxed goods are not held by Customs as legal tender, then the Area that generated the Determination Document or the Area of Documentary Procedure, when applicable, will remit the document and attachments within a maximum term of seven (07) week days to the Coactive Executor to start procedures for Coactive Collection.   
  2. When the duties payable are determined by National Intendencies, the documents will be sent, in the same time as set in the clause above, to the Coaction Executor of the Customs Intendency where the customs debt originated. For this effect, it is understood that that the debt originated in the Customs Intendency is the customs debt covering schedules, operations, infractions, duties --customs and administrative-- produces in the corresponding jurisdictions.  

Debts with Impugnative Recourse

    1. If a debtor interposes an impugnative recourse within the period established in the Tax Code, the legal collection action will be suspended until the claim is solved, only in the case of the particular debtor. 
    2. In the case that a Resolution dictated at the final level is favorable to the interested party, then the orders for collection will be lifted and the proceedings closed. 
    3. However, if a Resolution duly considers the impugnative recourse and determines a new amount to be charged, then the original Notification of Duties Payable will be annuled and the new Notification be applied.  

GENERAL PROCEDURE: INRA-PG.02 - ADMINISTRATIVE COLLECTIONS