US customs tightens requirements for advance notice

The Advanced Passenger Information System (APIS) is an electronic data interchange system established by US Customs and Border Protection. US Customs in New York/New Jersey and other US ports are going to start enforcing APIS regulations more strictly than they have since  the inception of the regulations in December 2008.  Many ships make mistakes in their E-NOA (Electronic notice of arrival) and APIS reports (eg the crew list portion of the E-ANOA). Commonly such mistakes are considered to be minor and therefore the E-ANOA is often accepted by the US Coast Guard and APIS with no penalty.  Now it seems that even minor errors (misspelled name, transposed dates, etc…) will generate penalties starting at $5,000 for first offences and going up to $10,000 for additional violations.  It is strongly recommended that each ship  calling in US ports ensure that the captain and crew carefully check the data on their E-ANOA and APIS reports to ensure there are no mistakes.