Published in the Daily Bugle, February 16, 2024
The last column provided one pundit’s opinion on how the EAR treats Printed Circuit Cards (PCBs) for military items, and made a passing reference to the 600 series .y entries. The .y family deserves more than that.
The .y entries for 600 series enumerate military items of such low sensitivity that they don’t require a National Security (NS) control – just Anti-Terrorism is good enough. They don’t require a global Regional Stability (RS) control – just to China, Russia, or Venezuela. Having your item show up in a .y entry is good news, as that means designing them, making them, and shipping them is a whole lot easier.
While there can only be one right answer for where PCBs are controlled[1], when it comes to the .y entries, there are a lot of right answers. It’s a jump ball when choosing between 3A611.y and other .y (e.g., 9A619.y) entries due to the wording in 3A611.y of “..not elsewhere specified in any paragraph other than the .y paragraph of a “600 series” ECCN..” That text was added in November of 2016, with the Second Revision to military aircraft and engines. In response to one commenter stating that moving items between .y lists creates work with no real value, BIS in its infinite wisdom agreed. To quote from the preamble:
“Accordingly this rule revises paragraph .y in ECCN 3A611 to allow, but not require, commodities enumerated in that paragraph or in other .y paragraphs to be classified either under 3A611.y or the other .y paragraph by revising the italicized phrase noted above to read ‘‘not elsewhere specified in any paragraph other than the .y paragraph of a ‘600 series’ ECCN’’.”
That text, unique to 3A611.y, creates an equivalency among it and the other .y entries, but no precedence. If you’ve been classifying your aircraft switch under 9A610.y.23, you’re not required to change it to 3A611.y.21. That you get to pick your .y ECCN isn’t clear from the regulation wording, but the lack telling you that you can’t allows it, and while not regulatory language, the 2016 preamble confirms BIS’s intent.
This is a Good Thing. One path BIS didn’t take during ECR was to create a single 600 series .y entry for the non-significant parts. But that “pick what you want” option is embedded in two specific entries – if you have an aircraft part or an engine part, you can pick from either 9A610.y, 9A619.y, or 3A611.y lists.
Where this comes in handy is if you have a central J&C database of all your items (and this is a very good thing to have,) you don’t have to spend a lot of time and effort moving items between .y ECCNs. If you have an aircraft fluid filter and you’ve been calling it 9A610.y.8, no worries if a supplier decides it’s an engine filter under 9A619.y.4. You’re both right, and can spend time arguing over other things.
An important note, found in both 9A610 and 9A619 is that “fluid” is defined to include both liquids and gasses. A fluid filter can be an air filter, a fuel filter, a hydraulic filter, etc. 9A619.y.2 calls out “oil lines and tubes”, but a line carrying oil (a fluid) could equally fall under 9A619.y.3 “fluid hoses and lines.”
ECCN 9A515.y is worth a few words, as it’s a bizarre entry for a number of reasons. First off, the construction is strange – it doesn’t include the “as follows” nor end with a colon as you would expect of a list based entry. But the biggest issue is that 9A515.y controls items that “would otherwise be within the scope of ECCN 9A515.x but have been identified …in a CCATS”. However, 9A515.x specifically omits microelectronic circuits and discrete electronic components – yet 9A515.y.1 through y.4 describe discrete electronics. Therefore, those items listed in y.1-y.4 would never be in the scope of paragraph .x in the first place. It also implies that items can’t be in .y unless they were put there by a CCATS – something you don’t know unless you filed one.
Now, we know what BIS meant – they listed the rationale for putting items into 9A515.y when they should have just worded it the same as the 600 series .y entries. And no, you don’t need to cite a CCATS to classify items into 9A515.y. Rest assured, there is work being done behind the scenes to clean up 9A515.x and .y, but these things take time. I’m sure the Space industry would love to have the aircraft .y control for things like galleys, lavatories, and public address systems.
Got J&C questions? – please reach out to me at ArtOfJC@arinovis.com
[1] And I’m hoping mine is the right one….