July 3, 2020

A company that uses a global trade management software system can reduce the costs, risks and delays associated with manual compliance and tracking efforts.

If your company imports or exports physical goods or digital products, or conducts global e-commerce, there is a strong chance that you will need some form of global trade management (GTM) system. Despite this being an essential requirement, companies of all sizes still try to manage their global trade and logistics manually, with employees having to resort to dealing with the arduous task of analyzing spreadsheets packed full of data.

Integration of national economies contributing to globalization has been one of the most important developments of the last century and led to tremendous growth in trade between countries. Exports today are more than 4,000-times larger than they were a century ago. New technologies in this modern age have made the world a more accessible place than ever before, drastically increasing complexity in international trade.

No one can predict what will happen after October 31st,  and with the situation remaining fluid the impact that upcoming UK sanctions will have on business remains unknown. This uncertainty has resulted in many organisations failing to prepare for the impending exit from the European Union and many are finding that they may not have systems in place or resources available in case of a “No Deal” scenario.

National Oilwell Vargo Inc. (NOV), a houston based drilling company, agreed to pay a criminal fine of $25 million to the Department of Justice (DOJ) under the Non-Prosecution Agreement entered with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas. This was a result of a settlement reached with DOJ, DOC, OFAC for violating trade sanctions by selling and exporting goods to Iran, Cuba and Sudan starting from the year 2002 leading upto 2009.

American Shipper discussed in its latest Export Benchmark Report the main concerns of Exporters. Not very surprising small & medium sized as well as large shippers have in common that the increase of costs of compliance are one of their main concerns. For large shippers this is equally concerning as the increased import enforcement at destinations and the delays at customs.

A recent study from American Shipper showed that 70% of manufacturers and 80% of retailers use automation for the Export compliance. Those numbers are steadily increasing in the past 7 years this study has been performed.

With the latest developments such as the implementation of the ACE (Automated Commercial Environment) or the new drawback law, more and more importers choose self-filing over outsourcing. In their latest Import study American Shipper found out that the percentage of self-filing importers nearly doubled between 2014 and 2016.

Earlier this year the public of the British empire had the chance to vote if they want to stay a part of the European Union or if they are in favor of the Brexit (British Exit from the EU).

The vote was close. About 52% of the public voted in favor of the Brexit. Great Britain will leave the European Union but the entire process of exiting the EU will take about 2 years. That means not Great Britain and the EU got 2 years to set up processes and rules to prepare for that day. It also means companies involved in Global Trade to and from Great Britain do have 2 years to prepare for the new scenario.

Any successful company is using metrics in almost all aspects of their performance. Those metrics are often called key performance indicators (KPIs). While it is very common to track KPIs in the field of Sales and Marketing, metrics are very beneficial when it comes to compliance, too.