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By Rajkamal Rao
As expected, you are likely to get a call from your shipping agent in India that your shipment has indeed arrived. Contrary to myth, the process from now on is not that difficult.
Once the container clears port formalities at the Indian port it will be shipped by road or train to the nearest customs facility, which could be several hundred miles from port. Although the double-locked and sealed container is traversing Indian roads, it is still deemed to be on international waters because it has not yet been cleared by Indian customs, in your presence.
In preparation for clearance, your shipping agent will ask you to fill out the Transfer of Residence forms and print the front & back pages (3 copies). You will be required to submit an Electronic Declaration sheet which is simply an inventory of all the electronic items that are in your container.
You will be asked to present copies of all pages of your passport - or rather the passport of the person in whose name the shipping documents are in - a Rental Agreement or home ownership paperwork for address proof and Proof of Employment (this last document is not quite as important as the first two). It may be best to have your shipping agent come to your home and walk you through all this paperwork - rather than trying to do all of these on your own.
Your agent will take all of the paperwork and supporting documentation - and using the authority vested in him to act on your behalf - will file a formal application with Indian customs for release. The agent will work with the Inspections Officer to secure a date for an inspection as early as possible.
Make sure that the passport holder - the person in whose name the shipment was sent - is present for the inspection. Your shipment will not even be considered for inspection if the passport holder does not arrive at the terminal at the appointed time.
The concept of demurrage is important here. This refers to the period when the container is still in possession of the shipping company - generally, five calendar days (not working days) after the container arrives at the Indian port - before it can be transferred to you. The transfer of possession to you can only occur if Customs can clear your container first. If Customs does not take up your container for inspection within those five days, the shipping company will charge you a fee for each additional day it is in its possession. Although you had nothing to do with the delay.
For these reasons, once the date of inspection is finalized, it is generally extremely difficult to change it. And even if you can somehow work a reschedule you will be paying demurrage charges of several hundred dollars if the new date falls beyond the demurrage window.
On inspection day, be sure to be at the terminal early. Indian Customs officials do not provide a time slot for inspection but you can be reasonably certain that your shipment will be inspected on the day of the appointment. Expect to wait several hours in a waiting room that may be hot with little or no facilities. Take a book with you to while away the time. Also, your shipping agent would have advised you to bring sufficient cash to pay customs duties, if any. In addition, expect to pay a nominal amount - about INR 8,000, in cash - towards “port charges”. These are to cover the cost of storing and moving your container around in the customs terminal. You will get a receipt for this charge - at least, a partial receipt!
And then, the moment will arrive. The Customs official will invite you to his office, examine all of the paperwork filed by your agent and ask you to declare what is in the container. The official already knows what is in it - he is simply attempting to judge you by your responses. It is best to be open and upfront about your situation - explain how long you lived abroad, which items are new and what is in the shipment. The official is most concerned about your Electronic Declaration form, so if you score credibility points with him here, the rest of the process is likely to be smooth.
Suddenly, the interview is over. You will be asked to go to your container and a group of day laborers and terminal workers will swarm around you. The shipping agent and the customs officer will walk with you.
First, a fork lift driver will get an empty container (call it domestic) ready and place it near your international container. And then, as if on cue, the customs officer will ask you for approval to break the international container’s seal. A terminal worker will use bolt cutters to break the seal and the doors are swung open.
The day laborers will rush to unload your container. They do this job every day, but it is best to take charge and guide them as to where sensitive items may be present in that steel container of yours. Also, counsel them to be slow as you do not want something dropped and damaged after your shipment has made it this far.
Under your watchful eyes, each item is carefully loaded to the domestic container. The customs official may call on the load foreman to randomly break open a box to verify contents. If you have not previously declared an item of value and this is found during these random searches, you are likely to pay - either because your credibility is diminished during any negotiation that may occur later or when the official simply decides to go by the book and levy fees as required by law.
When the load to the domestic container is complete, you are asked to go back to the customs officer’s office. This is the most critical part of the inspection process. The officer will estimate what duties he believes you need to pay the Government of India. If yours is a corporate shipment, this judgment will probably stand. But if you are a private shipper, there is some room for negotiation. If the official is corrupt - you will know this when he begins the negotiation process himself - you will have more wiggle room, and because you are at his mercy, few options even if you don’t want to pay a bribe. Finally, the two parties will settle on an amount. Immediately afterwards, the shipping agent will collect the amount from you and make payment to the government. Insist on a receipt to know how much of what you paid the agent actually went to the government. Within a day or two, the customs officer will sign off on the paperwork releasing the shipment to your agent.
It’s best if one other person - the spouse - can go to the terminal as well because it sometimes takes two pairs of eyes to oversee the unload and load process. Both persons should allow for being away from home the entire day - and make arrangements to have children cared for (although this is generally never a problem in India). At a minimum, the second person should join the passport holder at the time when the seal is about to be broken.
Depending upon the deal that you have with your US shipper, the shipping agent is responsible for delivering your domestic container to your home, unloading and unpacking all items (including each box) and arranging them to their assigned places. All furniture should be re-assembled by your agent. The crew may complain that assembling furniture does not apply to new furniture - the kind which comes in flat packages - because of the time involved in putting it together. But a small tip will get the job done. Remember that you are now in the land of extremely cheap labor. A lunch bonus of INR 800 for a crew of four followed by a tip of INR 1,000 for a full day of work will endear them to you. Plan two full days for this entire exercise.
By Rajkamal Rao
As expected, you are likely to get a call from your shipping agent in India that your shipment has indeed arrived. Contrary to myth, the process from now on is not that difficult.
Once the container clears port formalities at the Indian port it will be shipped by road or train to the nearest customs facility, which could be several hundred miles from port. Although the double-locked and sealed container is traversing Indian roads, it is still deemed to be on international waters because it has not yet been cleared by Indian customs, in your presence.
In preparation for clearance, your shipping agent will ask you to fill out the Transfer of Residence forms and print the front & back pages (3 copies). You will be required to submit an Electronic Declaration sheet which is simply an inventory of all the electronic items that are in your container.
You will be asked to present copies of all pages of your passport - or rather the passport of the person in whose name the shipping documents are in - a Rental Agreement or home ownership paperwork for address proof and Proof of Employment (this last document is not quite as important as the first two). It may be best to have your shipping agent come to your home and walk you through all this paperwork - rather than trying to do all of these on your own.
Your agent will take all of the paperwork and supporting documentation - and using the authority vested in him to act on your behalf - will file a formal application with Indian customs for release. The agent will work with the Inspections Officer to secure a date for an inspection as early as possible.
Make sure that the passport holder - the person in whose name the shipment was sent - is present for the inspection. Your shipment will not even be considered for inspection if the passport holder does not arrive at the terminal at the appointed time.
The concept of demurrage is important here. This refers to the period when the container is still in possession of the shipping company - generally, five calendar days (not working days) after the container arrives at the Indian port - before it can be transferred to you. The transfer of possession to you can only occur if Customs can clear your container first. If Customs does not take up your container for inspection within those five days, the shipping company will charge you a fee for each additional day it is in its possession. Although you had nothing to do with the delay.
For these reasons, once the date of inspection is finalized, it is generally extremely difficult to change it. And even if you can somehow work a reschedule you will be paying demurrage charges of several hundred dollars if the new date falls beyond the demurrage window.
On inspection day, be sure to be at the terminal early. Indian Customs officials do not provide a time slot for inspection but you can be reasonably certain that your shipment will be inspected on the day of the appointment. Expect to wait several hours in a waiting room that may be hot with little or no facilities. Take a book with you to while away the time. Also, your shipping agent would have advised you to bring sufficient cash to pay customs duties, if any. In addition, expect to pay a nominal amount - about INR 8,000, in cash - towards “port charges”. These are to cover the cost of storing and moving your container around in the customs terminal. You will get a receipt for this charge - at least, a partial receipt!
And then, the moment will arrive. The Customs official will invite you to his office, examine all of the paperwork filed by your agent and ask you to declare what is in the container. The official already knows what is in it - he is simply attempting to judge you by your responses. It is best to be open and upfront about your situation - explain how long you lived abroad, which items are new and what is in the shipment. The official is most concerned about your Electronic Declaration form, so if you score credibility points with him here, the rest of the process is likely to be smooth.
Suddenly, the interview is over. You will be asked to go to your container and a group of day laborers and terminal workers will swarm around you. The shipping agent and the customs officer will walk with you.
First, a fork lift driver will get an empty container (call it domestic) ready and place it near your international container. And then, as if on cue, the customs officer will ask you for approval to break the international container’s seal. A terminal worker will use bolt cutters to break the seal and the doors are swung open.
The day laborers will rush to unload your container. They do this job every day, but it is best to take charge and guide them as to where sensitive items may be present in that steel container of yours. Also, counsel them to be slow as you do not want something dropped and damaged after your shipment has made it this far.
Under your watchful eyes, each item is carefully loaded to the domestic container. The customs official may call on the load foreman to randomly break open a box to verify contents. If you have not previously declared an item of value and this is found during these random searches, you are likely to pay - either because your credibility is diminished during any negotiation that may occur later or when the official simply decides to go by the book and levy fees as required by law.
When the load to the domestic container is complete, you are asked to go back to the customs officer’s office. This is the most critical part of the inspection process. The officer will estimate what duties he believes you need to pay the Government of India. If yours is a corporate shipment, this judgment will probably stand. But if you are a private shipper, there is some room for negotiation. If the official is corrupt - you will know this when he begins the negotiation process himself - you will have more wiggle room, and because you are at his mercy, few options even if you don’t want to pay a bribe. Finally, the two parties will settle on an amount. Immediately afterwards, the shipping agent will collect the amount from you and make payment to the government. Insist on a receipt to know how much of what you paid the agent actually went to the government. Within a day or two, the customs officer will sign off on the paperwork releasing the shipment to your agent.
It’s best if one other person - the spouse - can go to the terminal as well because it sometimes takes two pairs of eyes to oversee the unload and load process. Both persons should allow for being away from home the entire day - and make arrangements to have children cared for (although this is generally never a problem in India). At a minimum, the second person should join the passport holder at the time when the seal is about to be broken.
Depending upon the deal that you have with your US shipper, the shipping agent is responsible for delivering your domestic container to your home, unloading and unpacking all items (including each box) and arranging them to their assigned places. All furniture should be re-assembled by your agent. The crew may complain that assembling furniture does not apply to new furniture - the kind which comes in flat packages - because of the time involved in putting it together. But a small tip will get the job done. Remember that you are now in the land of extremely cheap labor. A lunch bonus of INR 800 for a crew of four followed by a tip of INR 1,000 for a full day of work will endear them to you. Plan two full days for this entire exercise.
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