New Certification Helps Automotive Companies Shorten Time to Cross the Border

SOUTHFIELD, Mich., April 27, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The Automotive Industry Action Group's (AIAG) Supply Safe program — a common system to help automotive importers and their suppliers comply with the federal government's Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT) — has debuted a new tiered pricing structure to make the program easily affordable.

Set up by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), C-TPAT allows participating companies that ship goods and materials into the country to become certified as a low-risk threat. Certification means that cargo can move more quickly through U.S. customs checkpoints.

"With four OEMs now involved, Supply Safe has been highly successful and was touted as a best practice by the U.S. Customs Border Patrol," says Lang Ware, AIAG's director of supply chain products and services. "With this program, manufacturers go through shorter lines to pass through customs."

Supply Safe includes the first common industry C-TPAT questionnaire along with corrective actions. Questionnaires are tailored for each type of supply chain partner including highway, rail, ocean carriers, customs brokers, freight forwarders, and third-party logistics service suppliers. The Supply Safe subscription service now offers a low subscription cost versus hiring a service independently.

The participating OEMs — Toyota Motor North America, Honda of America Mfg., FCA, General Motors — and their suppliers are actively recruiting others to join.

Starting as low as $3,500, the new tiered pricing is based on an organization's number of trade partners and is open to AIAG non-member companies. C-TPAT will include associations with Partners in Protection (PIP-Canada), Nuevo Esquema de Empresas Certificadas (NEEC-Mexico), and Authorized Economic Operator (AEO-Asia and Europe) as well. Under the new pricing structure, Supply Safe's benefits include:

• There is no cost to supply chain partners.
• OEMs and their supply chain partners have a common process to request, compete, and evaluate supply chain security.
• Threat assessment information is available for all countries and can be evaluated by specific trade lanes.
• Suppliers that have multiple OEM customers need only answer one questionnaire.
• AIAG provides first-line system support capabilities, answering both technical- and business-related questions.
• Changes to the C-TPAT program are monitored and incorporated into the system automatically.

AIAG is adding more OEMs and suppliers to the program to make it more robust. In addition, Ware says that other industries like aerospace and food services — virtually any company that brings goods across the borders — can qualify for AIAG's Supply Safe program and enjoy the benefits of C-TPAT.

For more information, visit www.supplysafe.org.

About AIAG

The Automotive Industry Action Group is a unique not-for-profit organization where OEMs, suppliers, service providers, government entities, and individuals in academia have worked collaboratively for more than 30 years to drive down costs and complexity from the supply chain. AIAG membership includes preeminent manufacturers and many of their parts suppliers and service providers. Visit www.aiag.org.

Contact: Greg Creason, AIAG 
Ph. 248.358.9775

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SOURCE Automotive Industry Action Group

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http://www.aiag.org