Turant Suvidha Kendras and Grievance Redressal - CBEC's Customs Manual 2025 - Customs

8. Turant Suvidha Kendras and Grievance Redressal: 8.1 Turant Suvidha Kendras (TSK) are dedicated cells in every Customs port of import manned by Custom officers for facilitating the trade in completing various formalities relating to the Customs assessment locally at the port of import. 8.2 The Commissionerate having jurisdiction over port of import would set up a Turant Suvidha Kendra for facilitating Customs clearances. It merits mention that to begin with each Customs station would set up a Turant Suvidha Kendra and the Principal Commissioners/Commissioners have been advised to devise suitable procedures for numbering, handling safekeep of documents handled in the TSK. 8.3 Some of the functions to be entrusted to the Turant Suvidha Kendra are: i. Accept Bond or Bank Guarantee; ii. Carry out any other verifications that may be referred by Faceless Assessment Groups; iii. Defacing of documents/ permits licences, wherever required; iv. Debit of documents/ permits/ licences, wherever required; and v. Other functions determined by Commissioner to facilitate trade 8.4 In addition to other functions, Turant Suvidha Kendra (TSK) at the Port of Import would act as Facilitation Helpdesk for any grievance related to clearances of the B/E filed in the port. The list of the TSKs and their email and telephone/ contact details are available at CBIC website may be kindly referred to. TSKs may also set up suitable online communication channels for quick redressal of grievances. 8.5 The Principal Commissioner/Commissioner at the Port of Import may also designate a nodal officer not below the level of Additional/Joint Commissioner who may serve as a single point interface for the escalation of the grievances in such port. The details of the nodal officer and his/her contact details would be made available through Public Notice and in CBIC website for escalation of any issues including the B/Es in the FA requiring urgent attention. The Principal Commissioner/Commissioner at the Port of Import may further make other necessary internal arrangements for co-ordination at the appropriate levels for early resolution. 8.6 To better address the grievances of trade relating largely to delays in assessment, DG Systems have operationalised an Anonymized Escalation Mechanism (AEM) on ICEGATE which empowers importers/Customs Brokers to directly register his/her requirement of expeditious clearance of a delayed Bill of Entry, which may be pending for assessment or examination. The features of the AEM includes: i. In case of delay of more than 1 working day, an importer/Customs Broker would be able to initiate AEM through ICEGATE or approach TSK for the same. ii. The AEM will automatically route the grievance to the concerned FAG/Import Shed, with a notification to Additional/Joint Commissioners of Customs of the concerned FAG and Port of Import. iii. The concerned FAG is required to dispose the grievance promptly and same shall be monitored by the concerned Additional/Joint Commissioner of Customs of the concerned FAG/Import Shed. iv. The status of the disposal would be updated on the dashboard of ICEGATE, TSK, FAG and to the concerned officers. [Refer Instruction No. 09/2020 dated 05.06.2020, Circulars No. 40/2020-Customs dated 04.09.2020, No. 45/2020-Customs dated 12.10.2020 and No. 14/2021-Customs dated 07.07.2021]