KARACHI, Jan 18: Customs clearance of the country’s external trade (imports and exports) on Friday came to a standstill following a breakdown in the web-based auto clearance (WeboC) software. As a result, many export consignments missed their shipping schedule, causing millions of dollars loss to exporters.

Customs authorities confirmed that the breakdown had taken place.

A leading exporter of home textiles, Shabir Ahmed, told Dawn his export containers could not catch their shipping schedule because the WeboC software for auto clearance failed to operate the whole day on Friday.

He further said that his requests for manual checking and examination of containers loaded with export cargo were declined by the customs authorities for which he had to airlift the goods at huge extra freight cost to meet the buyers’ deadline.

On an average, the country’s monthly exports come to around $1billion and imports around $1.5bn. This means per day exports amount to $30 million and imports at about $50m.

Presently the auto-clearance of import and export cargo is being processed for clearance through indigenously developed WeboC system operating at three container terminals, Pakistan International Container Terminal (PICT), Karachi International Container Terminal (KICT) and Qasim International Container Terminal (QICT).

The Pakistan Revenue Automation (PRAL), which developed the WeboC software, is also responsible for  the system, but exporters complained that the PRAL has  failed to meet growing challenges badly needed for automation of revenue collection and auto clearance of external trade.

Till filing of this report late on Friday evening, the system was working and exporters were worried about their delayed shipment and others rushed to airlift their export cargo to meet the time frame given by their clients.

“We are already faced with a host of issues like gas and power outages, closures and strikes along with an extremely poor law and order situation. The failure of auto-clearance system at customs is yet another setback for the country’s exports”, lamented Shabir Ahmed.

Although the customs authorities last week announced to extending the working of WeboC system from Jan 15 to off-port container terminal, Al-Hamd International Container Terminal (AHICT), they failed to do so and this shows how inefficient the PRAL is, he added.