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The Customs Practice Group of Lee & Ko successfully held the "2024 Customs Seminar for Trade Regulatory Discussions" on Friday, 18th October, 2024, amidst keen interest and participation from the attendees.

A broad range of clients who are involved in the global trade sector  -multinational and domestic corporations alike-  attended the seminar. The customs professionals of Lee & Ko proactively responded to the participants’ comments, which encompassed areas such as recent import / export / foreign exchange (“FX”) cases, and recent trends/practices of the Korea Customs Service (“KCS”).

The seminar was divided into three sessions. The first session covered ‘Key Investigation & Litigation Cases in Customs/Trade’, presented by Vin Ma. Mr. Ma, who worked as a licensed customs broker before being admitted to the Korean Bar and joining Lee & Ko, is an up-and-coming customs attorney. He covered the complex web of customs-related laws and regulations with ease, making ample use of key cases and easy-to-understand explanations.

The second session covered ‘KCS Audit & Investigation Issues Forecast’, presented by Jae-Wung Cho. Mr. Cho is a Lee & Ko Customs Practice Group partner with expertise in the customs profession due to his prior career in KCS. Based on his experience within both public and private sectors, he elaborated on practical KCS checkpoints, as well as potential red flags that should be noted by exporters and importers to improve their trade compliance scheme and ameliorate customs & FX concerns.

The theme of the third session was ‘Potential Issue of Duplication between Customs and FX Investigations”. Mr. Cho, after presenting various legal precedents and interpretive viewpoints which this practical theme might entail, encouraged participants to freely share their thoughts, including real-world KCS audit / FX inspection experiences. The seminar was wrapped up with a Q&A session.

Young-Gee Park, the lead partner of Lee & Ko Customs Practice Group, commented that “Lee & Ko sincerely wishes that this seminar would be a beneficial reference point for customs and trade operations, for domestic import and export companies”, and Jae-Wung Cho voiced thoughts “to continue updates for clients doing business in Korea, to help safely navigate the ever-changing landscape of the Korean customs / trade / FX areas and pertinent KCS trends”.

Amidst keen interest and participation, the Customs Practice Group of Lee & Ko hosted the ‘2024 Seminar for Customs Regulatory Discussions’ on Friday, 29th March, 2024.

Miscellaneous domestic and global corporate clients involved in the export, import, and trade sectors attended the seminar. The customs experts of Lee & Ko were met with an array of questions, comments, discussions raised by the participants on a broad range of topic, including 2024 customs/trade law updates, preferential tariff system, Korea Customs Service (“KCS”) trend/practice.

Among the tripartite seminar, the first session covered ‘Noteworthy Amendments to Customs, Trade, Foreign Exchange laws’, presented by Marvin. Marvin, with working experience a licensed customs broker before being admitted to the Korean Bar and joining Lee & Ko, is a up-and-coming customs attorney. He covered the complex web of customs related laws and regulations with ease, making ample use of key cases and easy-to-understand explanations.

The second session covered ‘Utilization & Fresh Issues of the Preferential Tariff System(Quota, FTA, etc.)’, presented by JW Cho. JW is a partner, with expertise in the customs profession thanks to multiple years of service in KCS(Seoul, Incheon Customs Offices) and Lee & Ko Customs Practice Group. Based on his experience within the public and private sectors, he elaborated on practical checkpoints (and, not to speak of, red flags) which should be noted for export and import business enterprises to ameliorate their trade compliance scheme and reduce customs-related concerns.

The third and final session covered ‘Recent Korea Customs Service’s administrative trends and implications’, jointly presented by Seung-Hak Shin and Young-Gee Park. Prior to joining Lee & Ko as an expert customs consultant, Mr. Shin had accumulated much practical knowledge working in KCS and multiple regional customs offices. Drawing from his knowledge, he shared highly practical points on the recent customs audit trend. As the lead partner of Lee & Ko Customs Practice Group and a former senior ranking officer in KCS, Mr. Park delineated essential parts of the recent customs criminal investigation trend for multinational & Korean businesses.

At the end of the line, the seminar wrapped up after a Q&A session with the Lee & Ko speakers and participants.

Young-Gee Park, the lead partner of Lee & Ko Customs Practice Group, commented that Lee & Ko “sincerely wishes that this seminar would be a beneficial reference point for customs and trade operations, for both domestic and global corporations”, and JW Cho voiced thoughts “to provide continuous updates for clients doing business in Korea, considering the ever-changing landscape of the Korean customs/FX/trade areas and pertinent KCS trends”.

On August 18, 2023, Lee & Ko’s Customs Practice Group held a seminar on ‘Amended Legislations for Customs, Foreign Trade and Foreign Exchange Transactions’.

In the first session, Jae Wung CHO, partner of the Customs Practice Group, introduced key amendments to the Customs Act and the Foreign Trade Act. He also covered customs-related legislation proposals that are expected to take effect next year, discussing businesswise important implications to mitigate import and export concerns.

In the second session, attorney Vin MA explained recent amendments to the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act and Regulation. He emphasized Korea Customs Service (KCS) is expected to undergo substantial changes in its regulatory practice in accordance with the "Plan to Reform the Foreign Exchange Transaction Regulations" announced on February 10, 2023.

In the third session, customs advisor Seung Hak SHIN shared valuable insights of core audit and investigation areas that KCS is likely to scrutinize. Furthermore, he shared flexible ideas to manage audit and investigation and to enhance compliance systems.