What to do when Nigeria customs service seized your car

Section 167 of the Customs and Excise Management act states that: “Any officer or police officer, or any other person authorised in that behalf by the Board, may at any time seize or detain anything liable to forfeiture under the customs and excise laws or which such officer, police officer or other person has reasonable grounds to believe are liable to forfeiture thereunder.

“Anything seized or detained under the customs and excise laws shall forthwith be delivered into the care of the Board and, subject to the provisions of the Third Schedule to this Act, shall, pending the determination as to its forfeiture or disposal, be dealt with, and, if condemned or deemed to have been condemned as forfeited, shall be disposed of, in such manner as the Board may direct.”

Also Read: Cars You Can Import Into Nigeria

The forces and obligations of Nigerian Customs Service authorities are accommodated under the Customs and Excise Management Act. The Act gives Customs authorities wide powers concerning the administration, assortment and implementation of obligations of customs and extract. Segment 8 of the Act really gives that all Custom Officers will have similar forces, specialists and advantages as are given by law to cops.

Subsequently, Customs officials have the ability to lead searches of vehicles where they have “sensible” doubts and request to review vehicle specifics. The law additionally gives them the option to seize and appropriate vehicles without legitimate freedom archives.

How do you know if your vehicle has legitimate customs papers?

For the normal Nigerian who purchases his vehicle from vehicle sellers in the country, the supposition will be that the vehicle was brought into the nation legitimately and the leeway records given by Customs given by the vehicle vendor are legitimate. However, it’s absolutely impossible to affirm this without going to the closest Customs office. What’s more, that includes the danger (in the event that you go there with the vehicle) of the vehicle being seized and presumably sold by the Customs office if the records are not discovered to be substantial.

This framework should be changed. There should be a simpler way one can affirm the validity of one’s vehicles freedom papers probably given by Customs. You can confirm your vehicles protection strategy utilizing the Nigerian Insurance Industry Database on the web so it makes sense that one ought to have the option to check one vehicle freedom simply, particularly in this cutting edge time of innovation.

As expressed before, in the event that you go with the vehicle to the traditions office to check its freedom papers, you risk it being seized and appropriated if the papers are discovered to be invalid or inappropriately enrolled. Under the Customs and Excise Management Act, a vehicle which has been seized by the Nigerian Customs Service for reasons unknown and no composed notification of guarantee has been given by the proprietor or any prerequisite has not been confirmed to inside a month from when the vehicle was seized, that vehicle will be considered denounced and relinquished. This implies in the event that you have not amended or given valid justification why your vehicle isn’t subject to be seized inside a month of the seizure, Customs will regard the vehicle as relinquished and may dispose of it by selling it, typically at a strangely modest cost.

There is likewise the likelihood that customs officials may mishandle the forces that conceded them. What is to stop an official announcing your vehicles freedom records counterfeit to make sure it very well may be seized and offered to a companion for colossal contrast in worth? It is highly unlikely for you to invalidate the claim that the archives are phony aside from going to the Customs office. What’s more, regardless of whether you refute that there isn’t anything with the vehicles desk work, you actually need to pay to have your vehicle released. It is hence prudent, prior to making your next vehicle acquisition and to dodge awful astonishments, to set aside the effort to affirm that the vehicle you wish to purchase was appropriately cleared by Customs and legitimate records were given.#

So, what do you do when your car has been seized by a customs service in Nigeria?

If your car has been seized by customs service, and you are unsure about the reason behind the seizure, you need to confirm if your customs duty papers are legitimate, if the car was cleared by customs.

Also Read:

• Cost Of Clearing Mercedes Benz Cars From Customs In Nigeria
• Cars You Can Import Into Nigeria
• Cost Of Clearing Honda Cars From Customs In Nigeria
• Common Mistakes Car Importers Make And How To Avoid Them

Before making any sort of payments, you want to ensure that you are standing in the right way with the law and not otherwise.

To confirm the legitimacy of your Customs Papers, you need to give the C-Number which will be utilized to call up the subtleties of your vehicle in the Nigeria Customs information base which is called ASSYCUDA (Automated System for Customs Data).  If the particulars of your vehicle are caught in ASSYCUDA, you’ll get a printout that shows the data used to clear the vehicle. If not caught, the vehicle can be seized by Customs Officials particularly when you’re travelling interstate. You may likewise experience some difficulty if the obligation was paid however the sum paid is excessively low. This term is called “short payment”.

For the time being, it is difficult to check custom verification online. This is on the grounds that online confirmation has not been made accessible at this point. Yet, the Nigeria Customs Service has made other accessible alternatives for checking your custom obligation papers from the solace of your home or anyplace. They have delivered their helpdesk contacts for individuals from the public who might want to check their custom papers without going to their office.