Replacing an Aging System
CBP is now developing the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) to replace ACS – a state-of-the-art system when it was developed more than 20 years ago, but one that is showing the signs of age. Developing ACE, which is already processing trucks at the nation’s 99 land border ports, is no small challenge – the new system must be able to handle the 11 million containers that arrive at U.S. ports each year and be capable of processing more than $32 billion dollars in duties, taxes and fees. Deciphering how ACS processes cargo today has proved challenging. ACS consists of a labyrinth of complex cargo processing rules that were developed over two decades to keep pace with the ever-evolving body of trade law and the steadily increasing need for greater scrutiny of America’s imports. Adding to the complexity is the fact that ACS is written in the now antiquated COBOL programming language.

Modernizing CBP Business Processes
The challenge is far greater than just rewriting ACS into a new programming language – at the core of ACE development efforts is the imperative to modernize and automate CBP business processes and improve information sharing across federal agencies. The ultimate measure of success will be to accomplish these goals while making the transition to ACE largely transparent, with no disruption in service and with minimal impact to trade partners. In this sense, it is what outside observers may not directly see that will bear witness to the true success of ACE.

Behind-the-Scenes Capabilities
The agency’s planned deployment of ACE rail and sea manifest capabilities in fall 2008 will provide a good example of how new ACE capabilities, which will have a minimal impact on the trade community, will profoundly add to mission-critical capabilities. When these capabilities become operational, trade partners will not need to change how they submit cargo manifest data. Yet, despite this lack of change for trade partners, the new ACE capabilities will provide CBP officers a consolidated view of rail and sea shipment manifest and entry data at the bill of lading or container level – all via a modern Web browser-like interface that will help facilitate the identification of shipments that may pose a risk and expedite the prearrival processing of cargo. The new rail and sea manifest capabilities will enable CBP officers to place or remove holds on cargo at the container level, which allows suspicious cargo to be held while the balance of a shipment is processed. In the end, all of these enhancements, as well as additional new ACE rail and sea manifest features such as “broker download” and customizable ACE reports on import transactions, will benefit the trade community in terms of more efficient processing of cargo.

In addition, ACE rail and sea manifest capabilities set the stage for ACE multi-modal manifest processing that will provide a single, automated cargo control and release system across all modes of transportation. These capabilities will provide CBP and trade partners with greater visibility of cargo status as it makes its way through the supply chain and offer the long-term prospect of creating a single document that can serve as a manifest across all modes of transportation.

The future transition to entry summary processing in ACE will also result in operational and process enhancements – not all of which will be immediately apparent. For example, the planned January 2009 introduction of entry summary processing in ACE for entry types 01 and 11 will include new “team review” capabilities. ACE team review capabilities will enable import specialists to electronically store findings in a searchable database, improving information sharing between a filer and import specialist. Over the long-term, ACE team review capabilities should lead to reduced information requests from trade partners and will help ensure consistent decision-making across ports.

Inter-Agency Data Sharing
Perhaps one of the greatest behind-the-scenes challenges of ACE development is the International Trade Data System (ITDS) effort to make ACE the single window for the collection and sharing of trade and transportation data. To achieve this goal, CBP must ensure that ACE encompasses the data requirements of 44 Participating Government Agencies (PGAs) that are responsible for ensuring that imported and exported cargo complies with U.S. law. That process entails ensuring that ACE is aligned with the strategic goals and objectives of each PGA, clarifying the specific data elements required by each PGA and translating those data elements into specific software requirements – all while staying several steps ahead of the software engineers who are developing ACE. Harmonizing the data elements needed by PGAs has been a continuous and challenging process. PGAs identified a total of 10,000 data elements that were needed through ACE. Based on this input from PGAs, ACE/ITDS staff have been able to pare the number of required data elements by 96 percent to an ITDS standard data set of 400 data elements – but only after a two-year effort of analyzing the initial 10,000 data elements, clarifying the definitions of needed data with PGAs and working with PGAs to identify and eliminate overlapping data requirements. CBP must also ensure that the ITDS standard data set is harmonized with the World Customs Organization Data Model, making it easier for trade partners to do business by minimizing the number of unique data elements required by governments around the world.

Throughout ACE implementation, CBP will continue processing the thousands of trucks and rail and sea containers arriving at U.S. ports of entry daily. Yet ACE will provide better visibility and availability of the key cargo information CBP officers need to make judgments about the risk of incoming shipments while enhancing the speed and efficiency with which legitimate shipments can be processed. The fact that ACE will process cargo quickly and securely will be a function of the development of software code that spans existing and future business rules, data requirements across the federal government and a transition to the new system that is largely transparent to trade partners. It is this combination of what is visible and less visible that makes ACE one of the largest and most challenging information technology projects that the government is undertaking today.