Commission Regulation (EC) No 3254/94 of 19 December 1994 amending Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 laying down provisions for the implementation of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 establishing the Community customs code

• Celex Number: 31994R3254
• Coming into Force: 01 January 1994,01 January 1996,07 January 1995
• End of Effective Date: 30 April 2016
• ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg/1994/3254/oj
• Published date: 31 December 1994
• Date: 19 December 1994
• Official Gazette Publication: Official Journal of the European Communities, L 346, 31 December 1994

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Commission Regulation (EC) No 3254/94 of 19 December 1994 amending Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 laying down provisions for the implementation of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 establishing the Community customs code

Official Journal L 346 , 31/12/1994 P. 0001 - 0031
Finnish special edition: Chapter 2 Volume 16 P. 0087
Swedish special edition: Chapter 2 Volume 16 P. 0087

COMMISSION REGULATION (EC) No 3254/94 of 19 December 1994 amending Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 laying down provisions for the implementation of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 establishing the Community customs code

THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community,

Having regard to Council Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92 of 12 October 1992 establishing the Community Customs Code (1), and in particular Article 249 thereof,

Whereas Commission Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 (2), as last amended by Regulation (EC) No 2193/94 (3), lays down provisions for the implementation of Regulation (EEC) No 2913/92;

Whereas the Community has decided to grant developing countries a new system of generalized preferences (GSP) for the period 1995-1997, following in particular the Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament concerning the future role of the GSP during the period 1995-2004 which included a reference to the importance of introducing a donor country content to favour the industrial integration of these countries with the Community;

Whereas it is necessary, whilst respecting the specific nature of each system of rules of origin, to improve the coherence between each system in order to facilitate overall legibility and in particular for the autonomous rules of origin contained in Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93;

Wheras the GATT decision arising from the Uruguay Round regarding cases where customs administrations have reasons to doubt the truth or accuracy of the declared value is to be applied by means of an amendment to Regulation (EED) No 2454/93;

Whereas it is appropriate to amend the provisions concerning documents which are required to establish the Community status of goods by introducing an element of flexibility taking into account the accompanying document for the movement under duty-suspension arrangements of products subject to excise duty as provided for in Commission Regulation (EEC) No 2719/92 (4) as amended by Regulation (EEC) No 2225/93 (5);

Whereas it is appropriate to take account of commercial practice in order to reduce the burdens on economic operators;

Whereas because of a significant increase of fraud in Community transit operations, it is necessary to widen the application of Article 360 and point 2 of Article 361 of Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 and to introduce further flexibility in the application of Article 361, by amending those Articles and deleting the Annex containing the list of sensitive goods, and to align the corresponding provisions of Article 368 (2) of Regulation (EEC) 2454/93;

Whereas the conditions governing the operation of a customs warehouse or use of the warehousing procedure in a type E warehouse should prevent the use of the procedure for the purpose of retailing, while allowing for certain derogations;

Whereas import goods which are stored in a custom warehouse, free zone or a free warehouse may undergo certain handling during the time that they are stored;

Whereas in order to harmonize the practices with regard to the usual forms of handling, they should be more clearly defined by drawing up a list;

Whereas a number of corrections are required to Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93;

Whereas, for reasons of practicality, arrangements should be made to ensure that Copy No 3 of the export declaration is returned only where the export really needs it;

Whereas it is desirable to provide that goods under excise duty suspension arrangements moving within the customs territory of the Community under cover of the accompanying document provided for by excise regulations need not be accompanied by Copy No 3 of the export declaration when transferred from the customs office of export to the customs office of exit;

Whereas Article 890 of Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 provides that duties may be repaid or remitted on imports eligible for Community treatment or preferential tariff treatment, where a customs debt has been incurred as a result of release for free circulation;

Whereas there are also cases in which the importer is able to produce a document showing entitlement to such preferential treatment but the customs debt has been incurred for reasons other than release for free circulation; whereas the obligation to pay duty in such cases, where no deception or obvious negligence is involved, is disproportionate to the need for protection which the common customs tariff is intended to provide;

Whereas provision should therefore be made for the customs authorities of the Member States themselves to decide, in accordance with Article 899 of Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93, on applications for the repayment or remission of duties in such cases; whereas such a provision should be made applicable with effect from 1 January 1994;

Whereas the requirement to return to the exporter's Member State of establishment one copy of an export declaration which has been accepted by a customs office referred to in Article 791(1) of Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 should be extended for a further year;

Whereas Council Regulation (EEC) No 969/93 (6) removed the possibility of inserting national statistical subdivisions after the combined nomenclature; whereas that Regulation provided for the use of additional four-character Taric codes for the purpose of implementing specific Community rules that had not yet been encoded or not encoded up to the ninth and tenth digits; whereas the particulars entered in the second subdivision of box 33 of the Single Administrative Document should therefore be reduced to two characters and those entered in the third subdivision of the box increased to four characters; whereas these provisions should be implemented on 1 January 1996;

Whereas the list of free zones in existence in the Community and in operation has to be updated following a notification by the authorities of the United Kingdom;

Whereas the measures provided for by this Regulation are in accordance with the opinion of the Customs Code Committee,

HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Regulation (EEC) No 2454/93 is amended as follows:

1. Part I, Title IV, Chapter 2, Section 1 is replaced by the following:

'Article 66

For the purpose of this Chapter:

(a) "manufacture" means any kind of working or processing including assembly or specific operations;

(b) "material" means any ingredient, raw material, component or part, etc., used in the manufacture of the product;

(c) "product" means the product being manufactured, even if it is intended for later use in another manufacturing operation;

(d) "goods" means both materials and products;

(e) "value" in the lists in Annexes 15, 19 and 20 means the customs value at the time of importation of the non-originating materials used or, if this is not known and cannot be ascertained, the first ascertainable price paid for the materials in the Community (for the generalized system of preferences in Section 1) or in the beneficiary country concerned. Where the value of the originating materials used needs to be established, this point shall be applied mutatis mutandis;

(f) the term "ex-work price" in the lists in Annexes 15, 19 and 20 means the price paid to the manufacturer in whose undertaking the last working or processing is carried out, provided the price includes the value of all materials used in manufacture, minus any internal taxes which are, or may be, repaid when the product obtained is exported;

(g) "customs value" means the customs value as determined in accordance with Articles 28 to 36 of the Code (Agreement on the implementation of Article VII of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade established in Geneva on 12 April 1979);

(h) "chapters" and "headings" means the chapters and the headings (four-digit codes) used in the nomenclature which makes up the Harmonized System;

(i) "classified" refers to the classification of a product or material under a particular heading;

(j) "consignment" means products which are either sent simultaneously from the one exporter to the one consignee or covered by a single transport document covering their shipment from the exporter to the consignee or, in absence of such a document, by a single invoice.

Section 1

Generalized system of preferences

Subsection 1

Definition of the concept of originating products

Article 67

1. For the purposes of the provisions concerning generalized tariff preferences granted by the Community to certain products originating in developing countries (hereinafter referred to as 'beneficiary countries'), the following shall be considered, subject to paragraph 3, to originate in a beneficiary country;

(a) products wholly obtained in that country, within the meaning of Article 68;

(b) products obtained in that country in the manufacture of which products other than those referred to in (a) are used, provided that the said products have undergone sufficient working or processing within the meaning of Article 69;

2. For the purposes of this Section, products originating in the Community within the meaning of paragraph 3 which are subject in a beneficiary country to working or processing going beyond that described in Article 70 shall be considered as originating in that beneficiary country.

3. Paragraph 1 shall apply mutatis mutandis in order to establish the origin of the products obtained in the Community.

Article 68

1. The following shall be considered as wholly obtained...