Under the provisions of Article 3 of the WTO Agreement on Trade Facilitation, Members are required to issue advance rulings regarding the tariff classification and the origin of goods in accordance with the provisions of that article. Members are also encouraged to issue advance rulings for other areas such as Customs valuation and requirements for relief or exemption from Customs duties.
The key objective of advance ruling programmes is to provide decisions on the classification, origin and valuation of commodities prior to their importation or exportation, thus adding certainty and predictability to international trade and helping traders to make informed business decisions based on legally binding rulings.
Customs administrations also benefit from having advance knowledge of future importations which is useful for risk management purposes.
In order to achieve the establishment of an effective advance ruling programme, the WCO has developed the “Technical Guidelines on Advance rulings for classification, origin and valuation (2018)”.
This Technical Guidelines are to be read together with the “Guidelines on Customs Infrastructure for Tariff Classification Valuation and Origin (2015)”, and the “Diagnostic Tool on Tariff Classification, Valuation and Origin Work and Related Infrastructure (2015, updated 2016)”.