A company did not violate customs rules

A Ukrainian-Belgian OTS-UKRAINE Ltd. enterprise complained to the Business Ombudsman Council. The company imports and produces industrial adhesive tapes and was relocated from Kyiv Oblast during the active phase of hostilities. The company was concerned by the fact that Lviv Customs, during the customs clearance of production equipment, unreasonably opened an administrative case against its director for customs rules violation.
For many years, the company imported production equipment, so-called “slitters”, for cutting rolls of adhesive tapes under the same Ukrainian Classification of Goods for Foreign Economic Activity (UCGFEA) code.
However, last time, according to the customs authority, the company allegedly deliberately specified the wrong UCGFEA code in the customs declaration, illegally trying to reduce the customs fees amount. For such a violation, the complainant was threatened with a fine amounting to 300% of the unpaid customs duties amount. 
The BOC investigator processed the case file and came to the conclusion that the company did not violate customs rules, and all the complainant’s documents contained true information about the goods. In particular, to hold the company liable, the customs had to prove the administrative offense full nature, namely that the declaration contained false information for the purpose of evading customs charges.
In an appeal to Lviv Customs, the Council emphasized that the information about false data was not confirmed by the documents prepared by the customs, but on the contrary, the documents provided by the complainant confirm correctness of the UCGFEA code definition.
After BOC intervention, Lviv Customs agreed that the company did not violate customs rules and closed the case.