The General Administration of Customs ("GAC") has recently issued the Announcement [2018] No.120 to provide clarity on matters concerning customs supervision for inbound and outbound consolidated transit goods via sea transport. This announcement will take effect from December 1, 2018.
The announcement states that, devanning and re-consolidating operations made within the territory for consolidated transit goods shall be completed at the operation sites under customs supervision for waterway transport at the inbound ports, and five requirements, one of which states that "operations, such as devanning and re-consolidation of consolidated transit goods, shall be all completed at the operation sites established for the consolidation", shall be fulfilled. Additionally, the announcement explicitly states that, relevant logistics enterprises shall, pursuant to provisions of the Administrative Measures of the Customs of the People's Republic of China for Manifests of Inbound and Outbound Conveyances, the Announcement [2017] No.56 and the Announcement [2018] No.93 of the General Administration of Customs in respect of the time limit for the transmission of electronic data on manifests, data items and requirements on how to complete the manifests, transmit electronic data, including original manifests, advance manifests, load manifests, dispatch manifests and international transit manifests, for consolidated transit goods into the customs administration system for manifests. Furthermore, the announcement notes that, as for imported goods among the consolidated transit goods, the declaration shall be filed to the customs within 14 days from the declared entry of the conveyance.