F I D I S E RV ICES FIDI CUSTOMS GUIDES RELEASED FOR PUBLIC USE FIDIs highly successful customs guides have now been added to the public FIDI website, making these valuable industry publications freely available to the general public. Marie-Pascale Frix, FIDI Business Intelligence Manager, explains why MARIE-PASCALE FRIX, FIDI BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE MANAGER T he FIDI Customs Guide for household goods and personal effects is currently divided into two publications per country: the Import Guide and the newly published Export Guide. Until now, this publication was only available to FIDI Affiliates (see Historical background box). So why has FIDI taken the decision to open it to everyone? The response is quite straightforward its overwhelming success. With the publication of the guides on FIDINET in 1996, FIDIs customs guides became one of the most consulted online services by FIDI Affiliates. The guides were shared with customers and partners, leading FIDI to undertake a major redesign in 2017. As the guides could not be accessed directly by customers or their operational team on FIDIs website, the FIDI community started publishing copies of the guides on their servers and public websites and the trend was followed by nonFIDI affiliated companies. This led to outdated versions being shared and used by customers, and customers sometimes contacting FIDI directly for customs information. Accordingly, the FIDI Board decided to make the customs guides publicly available when the new FIDI website was launched earlier this year. Why is this beneficial to Affiliates? 1. You can now give your customers, staff and agents direct access to the FIDI customs guide library. This is a great benefit for them and a powerful additional marketing tool for your company. To do this, simply add a link from your website to the FIDI customs guide library at www. fidi.org/about-fidi/customsguides Remember, when creating the link, set it to open in a new page, so the visitors link to your company website will remain open, too. 2. You have access to the latest edited version of the FIDI Import and Export Guides there is no longer a risk of distributing old information. 3. Private and corporate clients looking for customs regulations end up on the FIDI portal which leads to increased exposure for FIDIFAIM companies. Recommendations to benefit fully from this tool It is crucial for FIDI Affiliates to take the following actions: 1. Immediately remove any FIDI guides from your server and website 2. Create a link from your website to the FIDI customs guide page www.fidi.org/about-fidi/customsguides 3. Inform your operational staff to regularly consult/download the guides on fidi.org We would like to express our thanks to the FIDI Associations and their country customs ambassadors for their valuable contribution in reviewing the import and export regulations annually. l We would love to hear your views. For all questions, feedback, suggestions or recommendations for edits, contact fidi@fidi.org HISTORICAL BACKGROUND FIDIs customs guides were designed in the 1950s, when there were still borders between European nations. At the time, FIDI was a European-centred organisation and European traffic was mostly by road and relatively complicated because of 56 FF298 AugSept20 pp56-57 FIDI Services.indd 56 the various customs regulations that were applied by each nation. To help FIDI members, updated European customs regulations were published in the FIDI Vade Maecum, the predecessor of FIDI Focus magazine. By the 1980s, FIDI was a global organisation and joined forces with FEDEMAC to produce customs information on a global level. The FIDI Customs Manual the previously called Red Manual was born and is celebrating its 35th anniversary this year. WWW. F I D I . OR G 21/07/2020 11:43