Elements of Compliance in a Trade Service

As far as international trade is concerned, it’s important to understand that there every nation has different laws governing the right kind of trade. This is where trade compliance comes to the fore. 

What does trade compliance mean?

Trade compliance refers to trade operations governed under the various trade regulations encompassing trade activities like import and export of services, technologies, or products for that matter. 

Trade laws will include different import, export, and financial laws. 

Be it an organization delivering or providing any kind of trade service, being compliant is a regulatory requirement that is supposed to be fulfilled. For a long time, it was thought that compliance was only important for industries with heightened levels of security, like aerospace, telecommunications, defense, energy, or financial institutions. But now it is something more. 

The governments of different countries have also ensured that compliance is strictly adhered to, as non-compliance penalties are huge. 

Elements of Trade Compliance

Like you would have figured out so far, trade compliance is not a few lines of rules written down. It’s much more complex than that. Many elements in trade compliance come together with the right policies and procedures to form a consolidated trade compliance framework. 

Here’s a look at some important elements of a successful trade compliance structure- 

1- Classification of Tariffs

Ensuring the right classification of goods by using the right commodity and tariff codes is highly important for compliance with customs while also creating the right rates of duty, export control, as well as other custom practices and procedures. 

If you get the tariff classifications wrong, then there can be a lot of legal issues with customs. 

2- Licenses and Permits

When you look at the import and export of certain products, it is crucial on your part that you are aware of the required licenses and permits as well as their validity. In the case of controlled goods, importing or exporting without a license is a criminal offense, and your goods can be confiscated by customs. 

3- Export Control Laws

Many products and technologies are subject to legislation from the export board as these goods can have other potentially harmful uses. When it comes to product classification, as a provider of trade service, it is your responsibility to ensure proper product classification against the right kind of legislation, as it will help to establish the right license requisites. 

4- Management of Customs

If your business operations are subject to some kind of investigation from customs, it is crucial to have a real plan of action to take care of any compliance issues that might arise with speed and sophistication. Given the digital age, automated document creation takes care of a lot of issues that may pose such compliance issues in the future. 

5- Valuations

Each shipment needs to have a great valuation of shipment, and this valuation should be accurate enough in case a challenge is thrown at it. To make going through with this easier, this valuation should be by the World Trade Organization(WTO) and also be declared on the accredited Single Administrative Document or SAD.

How should you go ahead about it?

While these are just a few elements, there are a lot more of them that you can take into account. This is why it’s best to take a proactive approach for trade compliance so that you are always ahead in terms of any regulatory changes there may be. This is where a tool that is entirely automated can facilitate automated document creation holds a high amount of promise and should be given the right amount of attention. 

This is where Trade Technologies has been taking care of global clients for more than two decades. It offers tailored trade document management that takes care of your needs of compliance with ease. That’s cutting-edge technology for you.