Customs Brokerage

Customs Brokerage

NQCS provides technical and advisory services to manage safe, cost-effective international and domestic transport from source to site, together with Customs and Quarantine clearance.

As a specialist Customs Broker, NQCS can move your goods efficiently through customs.

Import Duty Savings

We consider one of the major advantages of our Customs Brokerage service is our expertise in accurate classification of our customers’ products.

Inaccuracy in tariff classification can attract penalties under the Customs Act 1901. If Duty is under paid because of incorrect classification, that Duty must be paid retrospectively, and Customs may impose financial penalties.

NQCS has never incurred any infringement notices, penalties, or sanctions against our business. This quality of our work flows on to our clients, none of whom have incurred any infringements notices.

 

Some products are complex products to classify for Customs tariff purposes, where interpretation at an active ingredient or molecular level is required. That level of understanding of the nature of chemicals and its application in a Customs tariff sense requires a specialist knowledge that NQCS holds.

 

Tariff Concession Orders

NQCS is proactive in identifying our customers products that may be eligible for Tariff Concession and strategic in the process of applying for new Tariff Concessions on our clients’ behalf. This involves:

  • Identification of Australian Tariff Concessions applicable to your products
  • Identification of opportunities where Australian industry is least likely to oppose applications for new Concessions.
  • Designing the wording most likely to secure Australian Border Force approval of new Concessions.
  • Designing the wording to best limit a new Concession to our customer’s product rather than broad industry use by your competitors.

NQCS also monitors Duty concession activity relevant to your industry and your products, including applications proposed/made for new Tariff Concessions and proposed Tariff Concession revocations.

 

Duty Refunds

NQCS’s preference is to always have applications for new Tariff Concessions approved by Customs well in advance of the arrival of the goods.

However, Customs’ service level standard for Tariff Concession processing is up to 180 days. Therefore, due to shipping schedules, goods can arrive in Australia prior to Customs approval being received.

In these cases, NQCS prepares and submits Duty refund applications on behalf of our customers and monitors the application process through to finalisation, providing reports to our customers to inform the allocation of funds.

 

Audit Assistance and Advocacy

NQCS proactively monitors changes in Customs’ interpretation of tariff classifications. When a change is made, our Customs Brokers examine our customers’ product tariff classifications on our database to determine if a product classification will be affected by the change. We also continually update our information holdings to include tariff implications on new products as they appear.

Where there is dispute over a classification a clear, concise, and scientifically accurate argument needs to be presented to Customs. Our customers rely on NQCS for significant support in these circumstances.

NQCS can support customers during post importation audits conducted by Customs. In these instances, we collate all documents and past correspondence in relation to the product classification under review. We can help to prepare a response to Customs and help with any infringement notices or non-compliance issues.

 

Information Databases

NQCS retains a comprehensive knowledge database incorporating product information and detailed supply chain information.

The product database contains information specific to the technical aspects of all our clients’ products including our customers’ – e.g., Customs tariff classifications, eligible Customs Duty concessions, Dangerous Goods classifications, and essential compliance data.

Our product database also contains detailed data in relation to the supply chain, transport, and delivery details specific to each product and delivery destination, personnel, and subcontractor supply information.  This increases NQCS’ self-reliance and minimises involvement of our customers personnel.

We have built information management systems around the data to enable ease of knowledge retention, information sharing and automated production of compliance documents. This provides a powerful management tool for planning, budgeting, reporting, analysis, and informed decision-making.