First and foremost, the CARM Client Portal is ready to be released on time. It’s just that it won’t.
The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) has announced that the scheduled release date of its CARM Client Portal (CARM = CBSA Assessment and Revenue Management) is being delayed. Sort of.
The CARM Client Portal is to be a new digital system for assessing and collecting duties and taxes on goods imported into Canada. The original plan was for it to come online and live on May 13, 2024, but It has been moved back to sometime in October 2024 for external shareholders.
However, CARM will continue its launch internally at the CBSA on May 13, as planned, to advance the CBSA’s compliance and enforcement efforts.
The delay for others is the result of strike vote activity currently underway by the Public Service Alliance of Canada, one of Canada's largest unions, representing over 180,000 people across the country. The possibility of a strike and its hypothetical impact on the CBSA’s operations in the event of a positive strike vote is why the CBSA opted to reschedule the launch for trade chain partners until October.
It’s a failsafe move to ensure the CBSA can support partners as they start using CARM.
Therefore, until the fall, trade chain partners will continue to operate as they have. Until October, the current status quo approach to calculating and submitting duties and taxes remains in place, impacting all commercial importers across Canada.
The CBSA held approximately: 100 consultation and technical working group sessions; over 160 direct engagement events; and has completed multiple cycles of testing, including over 10 months of simulation with direct participation by CBSA employees and industry.
The industry has worked to be ready with approximately 71,500 importers now registered in CARM—these importers represent over 92 percent of the volume of goods imported.
In addition to protecting and growing CDN $40 billion (~US $29 billion) a year in revenue for Canadians, CARM will provide many other benefits:
- Eliminate cumbersome and time-consuming paper-based processes;
- Provide better tools that will allow the CBSA to focus its compliance and enforcement efforts on potential bad actors;
- Improve functionality for importers through the ability to enroll in commercial programs, submit accounting documents, and receive notifications through their CARM Client Portal account.
The internal launch of CARM at the CBSA, starting on May 13, will allow the Agency to advance work toward the expected benefit of better compliance. The CBSA will use CARM to identify errors and discrepancies in duties and tax submissions and begin to work with industry in these areas.
These efforts respond to a study by the Auditor General of Canada, who had estimated that as many as 20 percent of goods coming into Canada were misclassified, resulting in a lesser amount of duty paid.