Used car dealer takes Customs boss to court

A FOREIGN-used car dealer, whose shipment of vehicles has been detained at the Port-of-Spain docks pending a proper valuation by the Customs Department, is to get a waiver on storage charges while the investigation takes place. Comptroller of Customs and Excise, through his attorney, gave an undertaking to the court yesterday to provide the dealer with a letter so the Port Authority will waive the storage charges on the 54 vehicles, pending the outcome of the investigation. Jerry Alexander, trading as Nakayama Imports, of Hutton Road in St Joseph, filed an application seeking leave for judicial review of the decision of the Comptroller of Customs not to provide him with the letter for a waiver of the storage charges.

The matter was called before Madame Justice Mira Dean-Armorer in the Port-of-Spain Second Civil Court yesterday. Attorneys Om Lalla and Kelvin Ramkissoon represented Alexander, while State attorney Chaitram Bhola appeared for the Comptroller. The judge granted Alexander leave to file for judicial review. The Comptroller gave an undertaking to provide a letter to the Port Authority by today acknowledging that Nakayama’s consignment of motor vehicles was the subject of investigation and deliberation relating to the determination of the proper values, and that the consignment be considered for a waiver of storage charges due and accrued. Nakayama imports vehicles from Singapore and Japan. Two shipments of vehicles arrived in Trinidad on April 27 from Japan aboard the mv Edsel. The consignment was valued at $1,420,094.41.

Alexander, in his affidavit, said that on May 6, his customs broker Harold Warwick informed him that the Customs and Excise Department had uplifted the valuations in respect of the said consignment and had demanded the payment of additional duties of $182,800. Alexander said he was dissatisfied with the increase and instructed Warwick to seek a review from the Customs Department. On May 28, Alexander said he wrote to the Comptroller of Customs asking that a note be issued to him directing the Port Authority to waive the storage charges on the consignment until Customs completed its investigation. Alexander said he still owed the supplier for the consignment. Alexander said port storage rent has reached $439,006.26 and is continuing at a rate of $6,651.61 per day.

“I am unable to afford to pay these rents. To do so would mean certain financial disaster for my business or would even entail a shutdown of my operations,” Alexander stated in his affidavit. Alexander, who has a staff of seven persons, said he approached his bankers on June 30 seeking an application for a loan to pay the storage, but did not qualify because of his financial position. Alexander said he had been unable to provide the vehicles to his customers and clients and he has lost the profits of $500,000 he would have made if he had sold and delivered the vehicles.