To facilitate the importers and exporters, the Central Board of Revenue (CBR) has decided to curtail the overlapping functions of four customs collectorates of Karachi in March 2005 as envisaged in the Customs Administrative Reform (CARE) Project.
Official sources told this correspondent on Monday that the tax authorities have decided to streamline the administrative and functional structure of four Collectorate of Karachi ie Collectorate of Customs, Export; Collectorate of Customs, Preventive; Collectorate of Customs, Appraisement; and Model Customs Collectorate (CARE).
A committee, headed by Collector of Customs, Export will mainly focus on identifying overlapping of functions among the customs collectorate. Other members of the committee include Collector of Customs, Preventive; Collector of Customs, Appraisement and Collector, Model Customs Collectorate (CARE), Karachi.
The CBR has given a deadline of one month to the committee to examine the administrative set-up in the light of CARE project and subsequently recommend change in the functions of these collectorates.
Sources said that the CBR has taken steps for automation of the entire customs regime under the Customs Administration Reforms Process (CARE). The importers would get the maximum benefit under the fully-automated customs clearance project, replacing manual clearance of imported consignments. The customs has installed machines at Karachi Custom House, which will reduce the time of documents clearance from three hours to 10 minutes.
The CBR objective under reforms is to devise a system for the importers, which would not only resolve problems of the importers, but it would also reduce the cost of the importers. A fully-automated system could avoid the involvement of human interaction where discretion could result to corruption.
On implementation of new system, computerised assessment and port operations will be carried out on 24-hour/seven days basis. There will be one window operation and the users will be informed about the status of their documents and consignments at each stage, sources added.
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