Export Controls

GAO assessed the Department of Commerce's procedures for providing oral advice to exporters regarding controls on the export of commercial products that could be of military use.

GAO found that: (1) the Bureau of Export Administration (BXA) reported that it received over 160,000 export-control-related telephone inquiries during fiscal year (FY) 1989; (2) the International Trade Administration (ITA) handled about 6,000 telephone inquiries and about 700 walk-in inquiries during FY 1989; (3) industry representatives reported that Commerce staff sometimes gave inaccurate or inconsistent advice in response to export control questions; (4) a firm's study of Commerce reported that inconsistent responses from Commerce caused problems for companies seeking definitive policy advice; (5) the export community's lack of confidence in Commerce's advice resulted in unnecessary follow-up calls by exporters to confirm the accuracy of advice; (6) Commerce's limited control over its staff, Commerce staff's failure to elicit key information from callers before providing advice, and high BXA staff turnover contributed to the provision of inaccurate and inconsistent advice; (7) most Commerce offices did not use the telephone log system Commerce implemented to allow supervisory review of oral advice given to exporters; (8) industry representatives reported difficulty in understanding and using Commerce's commodity control list; and (9) resource constraints and other priorities hampered Commerce's attempts at improving the control list.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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