KARACHI: MCC Appraisement West has served a Contravention Report on M/s. Carlcare Service (pvt.) limited and clearing agent M/s. Pak Malaysia Shipping Agency for the offence of mis-declaration of description, classification and weight of the imported goods to fraudulently evade government revenue.
On the instructions passed through Collector Appraisement West Tahir Qureshi to Additional Collector Yasir Kalwar to increase vigilance on the flow of consignments through green and yellow channel; Deputy Collector Faizan Badar and his team led by Principal Appraiser Amjad Rajper has launched a crackdown on the misuse of green channel and yellow channel facility.
During the course, a consignment imported by M/s. Carlcare Service declared to contain mobile phone parts. (432,000 pieces) through authorized clearing agent M/s Pak Malaysia Shipping Agency was selected for scrutiny.
On the instructions of Deputy Collector Faizan Badar, the consignment was physically examined. The consignment was found to be mobile data charging cable, (432000 pieces) of Infinix brand.
Importer and his authorized clearing agent, declared the goods as mobile phone parts, a vague and general kind of description under PCT 8517.7900 attracting 11% Custom Duty, 5% Regulatory Duty, 2% ACD. Whereas the actual goods are not mobile phone parts rather the imported goods are USB data charging cable, which falls under PCT 8544.4290 chargeable to 20% CD, 6% ACD.
Moreover, the declaration of incorrect PCT was an attempt to clear the goods at suppressed value. Furthermore, the importer through authorized clearing agent mis-declared the weight of the goods.
The whole scheme of mis-declaration of description, classification and weight of the consignment was designed by the importer through authorized clearing agent to hoodwink the Customs authorities to evade legitimate revenue, which if not detected, the government would have lost revenue to the tune of Rs10.442 million. Past import data pertaining to the importer and clearing agent is being compiled so that an FIR could be lodged against them.
To recall, Deputy Collector Faizan Badar recently detected another mega case of revenue evasion through mis-declaration and apprehended offending goods over Rs2.5 billion.
Sharjeel Jamal, expert on Customs IT system, said the Risk Management System (RMS) of WeBOC was inefficient and faulty. He said that he had brought the issue into the notice of Chief Collector, Chairman FBR, and even lodged complaint on Prime Minister Portal. He offered all his assistance to the authorities in this regard.
Jamal said billions of dollars of money laundering through over-invoicing was done through exploiting many loopholes in the system, while equal amount of government revenue was evaded through under-invoicing and mis-declaration.
He said Public Accounts Committee (PAC) should take up the issue and conduct comprehensive audit of WeBOC system. It may be mentioned here the WeBOC System has never been audited.