Customs Infringements: New Amounts and Changes in the Procedure for Filing Away Summary Proceedings

The General Instruction (GI) 2/2023, issued by the Federal Administration of Public Revenues, was published in the Official Gazette on January 30, 2023. Following it, the amounts for filing away the summary proceedings investigating alleged customs infringements were updated, and it was included as a condition for it to pay all the taxes claimed within the term granted to answer the hearing. This last requirement applies to those proceedings in which, in addition to the fine, a tax claim must be made.

Now, it will be possible to file away the proceedings in which penalties for customs infringements fall within the following scopes:

1. Complaints for infringement of sections 954, 962, 968, 969, 970, 972, 973, 977 to 982 and 991, 965 paragraphs b) and c) of the Customs Code (CC); Law No. 22415 as amended; and section 9 of Law No. 21453 as amended: when the minimum fine is less than ARS 360,000.
2. Cases included in paragraph a) of section 965 of the CC, when the penalty of confiscation may be substituted by a fine equal to the market value under the terms of section 922 of the CC, which is less than ARS 360,000.
3. In the cases provided for in sections 985, 986, and 987, and in paragraph 2 of section 970 of the CC, the amount of the minimum fine that could be imposed –for determining whether to file the case– will be increased according the market value of the merchandise involved.

In the abovementioned cases, the filing away will only proceed if the alleged infringer does not have past cases filed away because their added minimum fine exceeded ARS 360,000, for the same type of infringement.

For such purposes, it will be considered records the actions allegedly committed and filed away during the 12 months prior to the date of the alleged new infringement for which the action to be assessed was filed.

On the other hand, the filing away will proceed if more than one proceeding for the same infraction is being processed involving the same reported party, and if the minimum amount established in this general instruction is exceeded.