SAN DIEGO — A rare Senate and House bipartisan agreement on an issue — the C-TPAT Pilot Program Act of 2022 — is being celebrated by the Transportation Intermediates Association as a major victory for the brokerage sector.
In her state of the industry address here to kick off the group’s first in-person convention since 2019, TIA President Anne Reinke touted the progress of the legislation and placed it No. 1 on her list of the organization’s achievements.
C-TPAT, or Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, serves as sort of a TSA Pre-Check for freight moving across international borders. Carriers and shippers that receive that designation can move more quickly across international lines due to their classification under C-TPAT.
But brokers have not been able to get C-TPAT designation. And that has been a significant problem for 3PLs that regularly engage in cross-border activity.
Chris Burroughs, TIA’s vice president of government affairs, said in an interview at the TIA meeting that not being part of the program has put brokers “at a pretty large competitive disadvantage.”
