MANILA: The Bureau of Customs (BOC), government’s second largest revenue generating agency, is planning to auction off nearly P1 billion worth of overstaying cargoes to boost its tax collection and decongest the several port areas.
Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina yesterday directed his port officers to review all overstaying cargoes in their respective areas for possible auction in accordance with the Tariff and Customs Code of the Philippines (TCCP).
“We have overstaying cargoes that have been idly sitting on the ports,” Lina said in a statement.
In the Port of Manila alone, Lina disclosed there are cargoes that can translate to P300 million in revenues.
“Importers and brokers need to stop using our ports as warehouses,” Lina said, stating the bureau is expecting approximately P1 billion in revenues to be generated from overall public auction sales.
For Port of Subic, Customs estimated that revenue could reach P150 million should auction sales of overstaying containers take place.
On the other hand, the Manila International Container is projecting P462.6 million in collections after its public auction sale of 1,542 containers.
As of April 25, 2016, Auction Monitoring Unit has accounted for P345.6 million in total revenue collection from auction from January to April of this year, which was gathered from Auctions Sales from six ports.
Overstaying cargoes are those that have either been seized or abandoned. Seized cargoes are those that have been issued an alert order and consequently a Warrant of Seizure and Detention (WSD) for violation of the TCCP, such as misdeclaration or undervaluation.
Abandoned cargoes are expressly abandoned by the consignee by writing to the Collector of Customs who has jurisdiction over his cargoes that he is abandoning his cargoes.
Cargoes are impliedly abandoned, when the owner, importer, consignee or interested party — after due notice — fails to file an entry within 30 days.
“Port fees such as demurrage, wharfage and storage fees are usually waived by the arrastre operator and Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) when the container or cargo, either forfeited or abandoned, is subject for disposal by the Customs,” Lina said.
“So, everything is done at no cost to the government, ” he added.
Records showed that for year 2015,Customs’ auction generated a total revenue of P996.3 million.
MICP garnered the highest revenue at P468.4 million, followed by Port of Batangas at P107.9 million and Port of Cagayan de Oro with P104.9 million.
