HTS to be Amended for WCO Changes on Feb 3, but Unofficial Version Available
This is a reminder that the U.S. Harmonized Tariff Schedule will be amended for hundreds of World Customs Organization-recommended tariff changes on or about February 3, 2012. At that time, ITC will implement the "official" HTS in its entirety, with the WCO-recommended and other changes. In addition, the printed official 2012 HTS will be available from the Government Printing Office. In the meantime, the ITC has made an unofficial version of the February 3 HTS available on its Web site "early," for HTS Chapters 1-97.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
A preliminary 2012 HTS is in effect now. The 2012 HTS that is in effect now (see here) is considered by ITC to be the "preliminary" version, and is to be used until the official February 3 version is implemented.
Unofficial Feb 3 version for chapters 1-97 available now. An unofficial February 3 version of the 2012 HTS is posted chapter-by-chapter at an ITC Web page here. This version is available for review and is not in effect. Note that the 97 chapters are posted towards the end of the Web page, so one needs to scroll down the list to find them. Each chapter file is in a 12XXC format and was posted on January 3.
Unofficial Feb 3 version of Change Record for chapters 1-99 available now. An unofficial version of the February 3 Change Record (which lists old 2011 HTS numbers and their 2012 replacements, etc.), posted on January 13, is also available at the ITC's web page, in file 12XXchgs, here.
ITC's report on WCO changes only. In addition, the WCO-recommended tariff changes themselves, that are taking effect on February 3, are posted in International Trade Commission Report 4276, which is available here.
Official 2012 HTS to be posted by Feb 3. The official 2012 HTS will be posted by the ITC on or before February 3, 2012.
(See ITT's Online Archives 12010412 for earlier summary stating that Proclamation 8771, to implement the WCO-recommended tariff changes, was to take effect on February 3, 2012.
See ITT's Online Archives 11122708 and 11123015 for initial list and corrections to 484(f) statistical changes for the 2012 HTS. See ITT's Online Archives 11122318 for summary of the International Trade Commission's online "preliminary" version of the 2012 HTS that took effect on January 1 (which does not reflect the WCO changes).
See ITT's Online Archives 11122017 for summary detailing the WCO-recommended tariff changes (affecting products in 54 HTS chapters, including many food and agricultural items), which states that these changes are required to be "substantially rate neutral.")