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Expert insights on cross-border payments, global trade, and international finance.
OPGSP stands for Online Payment Gateway Service Provider, the arrangement that let Indian exporters and importers collect and send small cross-border payments through an intermediary tied to a bank, rather than through their own wire transfer. It was never a licence. An OPGSP held no authorisation from the Reserve Bank of India. It worked by entering a standing arrangement with an Authorised Dealer Category-I bank, and that bank carried the compliance. That framework no longer exists. If you ar
A high sea sale is the sale of imported goods while they are still in transit, after the shipment has left the foreign port and before it is cleared for home consumption in India. Ownership passes by endorsing the bill of lading to the new buyer, who then becomes the importer of record, files the Bill of Entry in their own name and pays the customs duty and IGST. Two things about high sea sales changed after most of the standard explanations were written, and both change what you actually do. S
Form A2 is the application-cum-declaration you sign before your bank sells you foreign exchange and wires it abroad. It tells the Authorised Dealer who is paying, who is being paid, how much, and the part that decides everything downstream - why. It is issued under the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999, and since 3 July 2024 your bank must obtain it for every outward remittance, whether you are sending ₹40,000 or ₹4 crore. Here is the problem with almost every guide ranking for this term. T
In India, importers must comply with various customs procedures before their goods can be cleared. One of the most important documents in this process is the Bill of Entry (BOE). After filing a BOE, importers often ask: How do I check my Bill of Entry status online? The ICEGATE portal (Indian Customs Electronic Gateway) provides a quick and easy way to track your BOE status. In this guide, we’ll explain the meaning of Bill of Entry, what changed under ICEGATE 2.0, the step-by-step process to ch
Shipping Bill Status is the real-time customs clearance progress of your export shipment than can be tracked through ICEGATE (Indian Customs Electronic Gateway) . After your CHA files a Shipping Bill (export declaration) with Indian Customs, the SB (Shipping Bill) status shows whether your goods are approved, under processing, cleared for export (LEO granted), or if EGM has been filed by the shipping line. Tracking Shipping Bill status on ICEGATE is critical because it determines when your shi
IEC stands for Importer-Exporter Code, Before 2017 it used to be a 10-digit unique identification number but after introduction of GST in 2017 the Importer-Exporter Code for firms in India became the same as their PAN (Permanent Account Number), though you still need to apply it via the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) under India's Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Without an IEC, no shipment can legally clear customs, and no government trade incentives can be accessed for import ex
