Because ‘adventure’ really is the best way to describe this experience… “Dozens of meetings where new problems seemed to appear; we needed to be tenacious because among the other pilot companies, certain participants very quickly threw in the towel! We had the impression that the Customs Authorities had not completely measured the full impact of this new system on company organisation and logistical management. Thanks to this experience, our 3000 monthly export declarations and 800 import declarations are now all treated by the DELTA D (In-house customs clearance) system. We opted for the EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) transmission mode for our declarations via the DELTApass application developed by customs software company CONEX.”
CONEX: Principal actor in the Schneider Electric Industries Customs solution
After several years of managing its customs operations at a local level (PDD - In-house clearance procedure), in 2006 Schneider Electric Industries chose to centralise its declarations with the setting up of the PDU – Single Customs Clearance Procedure. “This new organisation meant centralising our customs IT system with the establishment of a dedicated server at a national level, hosting all the customs applications developed by CONEX. We completely industrialised our Customs solution with the help of our service provider, who was able to respond to our needs, including: capacity to connect 80 declarants simultaneously situated at 4 operating sites spread across France.”
CONEX: an obvious choice
For several years the CONEX company has supported Schneider Electric Industries, which uses a number of CONEX software solutions, for its customs operations treatment, but also for customs regulation surveillance and customs data updates (TARIC – EU Integrated Tariff and associated EU and national regulations, antidumping or preference measures, tariff suspension and so on). “300 to 400 customs nomenclatures must be monitored on a regular basis in relation to regulations which are in constant evolution. This represents a considerable work load, which can only be managed effectively with properly-adapted, user-friendly tools perfectly up-to-date with the latest regulations.” Strengthened by numerous years of collaboration, with the proven success of several projects, it seemed obvious to choose CONEX to be our partner in this DELTA pilot adventure. With their command of the IT environment and their considerable knowledge of customs, we were perfectly confident in their team. Above all, they were able to anticipate this customs revolution by alerting their customers in plenty of time.”
Unique internal training
“We have worked for several months on the CONEX DELTApass application, by way of 3 collaborators from our company who have undertaken a training course in Paris proposed by CONEX, in order to understand all the software manipulations.” “We then deployed DELTApass internally, first in the testing phase: our declarations were sent to the customs test platform, then in operational mode beginning June 2007.” The DELTA start-up necessitated the training of 80 people at Schneider Electric Industries; a big internal training campaign was launched, based as much on the regulatory aspects associated with DELTA as on the use of the DELTApass tool.
A very useful pilot programme
“Our contribution to the setting up of DELTA by the French Customs Authority is far from negligible.” A few examples: “In the test phase, we alerted French Customs to several system bugs which were then able to be resolved on their training/test platform: among other problems, the system would only accept one invoice number per declaration!” “On June 4, the day of our DELTA operational launch, we were faced with the same bugs as we had encountered earlier, but this time as we operated for real, with the risk of paralysing our road, air and sea traffic as we work in a ‘Just in Time’ transport environment. It was necessary to make our transporters and carriers aware of the situation and ask Customs to apply the fallback procedure. This mode makes it possible to print paper declarations so as to avoid blocking the flow of our import and export merchandise. As soon as the system is again functioning correctly, the fallback procedure demands that we send retrospectively all the declarations concerned.” “In the initial version of DELTA, it was not planned that the operator be able to make requests for corrections to declarations via the system. All rectifications were supposed to be carried out manually outside the on-line procedure! This seemed a pity considering the reality of logistics which binds us into the necessity of making last minute changes to our declarations, when for example we are no longer exporting 100 pallets by sea as scheduled, but 98 because 2 had to be sent urgently by express… After insisting a little, we finally managed to persuade Customs to allow the possibility of making requests for correction through the system, on the condition however, that a prior agreement be made with the customs office!”
A real nightmare
“When, at the beginning of July messages sent via DELTApass to customs were not returned due to the Customs platform being saturated, it was once again necessary to confront a very delicate situation, risking blocking our logistics completely.
However, thanks to the availability and reactivity of our project team as well as the technicians at CONEX, we were able to limit the impact to only a few late departures, without deteriorating the service to our customers.” “It is also important to underline the support we received from the local customs offices (Grenoble local office and the offices of attachment at Evreux, Isle-D’Abeau, Dijon and Angoulême) who at critical moments remained understanding and reactive, as much for allowing us to use the fall-back procedure as for releasing our declarations when the DELTA system blocked 100% of our exportations!”
A new era: “Gone are the days of the cd-rom containing our monthly declaration that had to be deposited at the local customs office! We can safely say that we have turned a corner with DELTA and entered the new age of e-customs”, conclude Céline GUILLEMIN and Adélaïde LECOQ, persuaded that DELTA will at last start sailing at cruising speed in the weeks to come.
Points of Reference
A word about Schneider Electric: World no. 1 in Electrical Distribution, no.2 in Automation Management, Schneider Electric employs 105 000 people in 106 countries. It possesses 205 factories across the world, 6 500 engineers in 25 countries and boasted a turnover of 13.7 billion euros in 2006. Company activity concerns four main markets: Energy and Infrastructure, Industry, Building and Residential.
CONTACT Press relations - Agence C3M - Tél. : 01 47 34 01 15
Suzana Biseul, suzana@agence-C3M.com, tél. : 06 76 61 50 79
Michelle Amiard, michelle.amiard@agence-C3M.com
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