Official website of the Department of Homeland Security
Technical Documentation for All CBP Automated Systems
These pages linked below provide the message formats and technical specifications necessary to electronically transmit data to CBP's automated systems, along with scheduled system outages that affect testing of software.
ACE Technical Documentation
| Import Manifest | |
| Entry / Entry Summary | |
| Exports |
Legacy System Documentation
These links contain detailed requirements for filing information to legacy systems including Automated Commercial System (ACS) and Automated Broker Interface (ABI) CATAIR technical requirements.
ACE Outage Schedules
There are two ACE environments available to the trade – Certification (CERT) and Production.
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The production environment is the day-to-day live ACE environment used to process import and export submissions.
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The certification environment is for trade users to test ACE capabilities prior to filing in the production environment.
Both environments are subject to both planned and unplanned outages. Planned outages are scheduled to conduct routine maintenance, while unplanned outages are to address critical system issues. Outages to the ACE Certification environment only impact parties testing software.
| Environment | Outage Window(s) |
|---|---|
| Certification | As Needed during non-business hours (i.e. from 5:30 PM – 8:30 AM) |
| Production |
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System outages are announced through the Cargo Systems Messaging Service. To subscribe, please visit the CSMS subscription page.
