Apologies for the late reply, was out of town for some business.
Please find parawise replies for various comments on this thread below:
Body was upgraded and the car was bought by a person who did not know about it. Customs confiscated the car in blue area Islamabad. After some litigation, the car had a lab test which came clear. Nothing was found altered/tempered.
The car was released after tax was paid to FBR after appraisal.
I checked all documents and consulted a few EXPERIENCED friends in your deptt before making the payment.
--> In your case, the body was changed by someone who fraudulently sold the vehicle off to an unsuspecting buyer, who was then apprehended by Customs. The reason that this body change was 'illegal' is because there is no proof of purchase of the replaced body. You can swap bodies / frames within the same vehicle lineage (more simply similar looking shapes) legally as long as you have a clean bill of entry for the new body / frame. Alternatively, if the vehicle is apprehended by Customs and there is no cut / weld / tampering, we are under obligation to release the vehicle to the bonafide buyer as per case law from the honorable High Courts. The contention of the honorable High Court is that the bonafide buyer (who has been defrauded by this body change) should not be at loss for a situation that he is not responsible for. An appraisment of the appropriate duties and taxes on the body is levied and the vehicle is cleared from the Customs end. The next thing to look into is getting the Excise records updated since the vehicle's chassis number and frame number are different after a body swap. An originally fitted vehicle will always have matching chassis number and frame number, there are no second opinions to this anywhere in the entire world.
The government wishes to facilitate people and hence allows them to swap engines, bodies and even chassis. This is only allowed because the class of vehicles that this can be done in do not have any spares manufactured locally. Take the Crown displayed above. The body or engine for this vehicle are not manufactured at all in Pakistan so the end consumer is allowed to change these as per his discretion. As long as the proper duties and taxes are paid, you can swap anything, anywhere for any reason you so please. You can legally swap one Toyota Crown body for another as long as both vehicles are duty and tax paid. You can import a Toyota Crown body fresh from Japan under Chapter 87 of PCT but the incidence of mere Customs duties is 100% since the body will be treated as a complete vehicle. In order to avoid the incidence of such high duties and taxes, swindlers find smuggled bodies / frames and replace them on genuine duty paid vehicles. The end buyer is given some gimmick paper work that is less than genuine but people still believe such things. Whenever such a vehicle is apprehended, it has to go through duel legal process (12-18 months of litigation) before duties and taxes are paid since the chassis number and frame numbers are now different.
The primary reason why people sell off such vehicles, even after Customs procedures have been clarified, is the risk of getting the vehicle confiscated again. There are a number of instances where such vehicles have been impounded for verification or reassessment. You could easily visit your nearest Customs station and ask the staff to show you around vehicles that have been apprehended in this fashion. Surprisingly, you will find a large number of confiscated vehicles fall into these categories. In case you want to avoid untimed seizure of your vehicle, please avoid such vehicles altogether. You never know when, where or how your vehicle might end up in verification / reassessment since Customs is authorized to make such stops as a discretionary matter.
Plenty of suzuki sj 410 are running with Sierra shells these days. I have seen 6-7 in Lahore customs office which were seized for body tax payment procedure.
I myself paid body tax of one in Lahore.
--> Please see the comments above on how these body / frame changes are being carried out.
This LC that I mentioned is somewhere around Okara. It has the frame of some Hiace (if i remember correctly) which was imported as AMBULANCE. Now, most of us dont know that if you import an AMBULANCE there is no custom duty on it. Please correct me if I am wrong.
There is a Toyota Estima in Islamabad which was imported under same scheme and is being used privately.
As far as my knowledge goes, body change is illegal if, for example, you put up a LC shell on a CJ5 frame by CUTTING/ALTERING the frame.
--> First things first, any cutting / welding / modification to the chassis is unacceptable and makes such a vehicle subject to outright confiscation. Moreover, if the frame has been tampered with to match the chassis number, the frame / body is also subject to outright confiscation. Any vehicles seized and then confiscated in this fashion are then appropriated for the use of Pakistan Customs as operational vehicles. The large majority of jeeps and saloons that you notice at the disposal of Pakistan Customs are essentially 'cut / weld' vehicles that have been confiscated outright. I might also take this opportunity to clarify that a lot of vehicles are seized and confiscated each month but even then people don't seem to get the message clear enough.
The import of ambulances falls into two broad categories - commercial and charity. If a hospital / individual is importing an ambulance for renting it out, the import is subject to applicable duties and taxes. However, the import of medical equipment (including vehicles) for registered charity organizations approved by the Ministry of Commerce is customs duty free. A significant example is the Abdul Sattar Edhi Foundation whose imports are not subject to customs duties and other taxes.
Please remember, BODY CHANGE TAX and amnesty are two different things
--> body / frame change tax is a regular operation while a general amnesty is a one off incentive to register illegal vehicles plying the roads. Changing the body / frame from one vehicle to another is pretty much just the same thing as changing your vehicle's headlights, given of course that all the applicable duties and taxes are paid on the changed component. Always remember that a body / frame swap is only allowed within the same lineage. To inform yourself of vehicle lineages, visit Wikipedia or any other automotive journals to see if a 1990 frame would be allowed for a 1995 vehicle etc.
Another clarification, body / frame change vehicles are not allowed for clearance even in an amnesty scheme as such. Some vehicles were cleared in the last amnesty and the inquiry has already been initiated in this regard. Pending the outcomes of the inquiry, such vehicles would be subject to seizure and confiscation since now the department has documented records of the owners available. If you must have a body / frame change make sure you have the right documentation. Unfortunately, non custom paid vehicles do not come with documentation and many a times tampered non custom paid vehicles are impounded too. A tampered vehicle will make you liable to fines and penalties too, so please always consult your nearest Customs station before buying into such vehicles.
my instance stands as it is - such vehicles are Magnets for customs vigilance & intelligence. Once apprehended trail of import papers or legal court paper work need to be produced before it is released.
--> ^^^ truer words have not been uttered on this subject. You should visit any Customs station near you and ask them to show you their yards where impounded vehicles are available. You will notice that there is a large share of jeeps and luxury saloons such as Crown. Once your vehicle comes on radar, you have to produce the relevant documentation regarding importation and subsequent sales. Typically, it is a tenuously long process to get such a vehicle released since correspondence to confirm the documentation takes time. Moreover, many a times there are apparent frauds that end buyers do not fully comprehend which causes confiscation of such vehicles. Haroon Tarrar has done the right thing by talking to Customs officials before pursuing any action, much appreciated.
But the scenario here is different what is going on that I buy a vehicle which has chassis frame beneath it my car model is say like 89. Now I saw a same crown which is of 92 model but has the same chassis frame patterns what I do I simply Purchase a NON custom Car of 92 model. I am not going to show the vehicle to custom authorities and some how get the bodies changed with each other and dispose off the non custom Chassis frame. Now the scenario is some how if custom department's intercept me and investigate the vehicle appearance which is not matching with the document's AKA Document's say it is 89 model and Appearance say it is 92 then they seize the vehicle and get it's foreinsek done if the Chassis is not tampered or CUT and Welded they will allow the user to pay some duty and fine's only on the newest body shape the Owner will provide the Part's Bill of entry and purchase receipt's from the local scrap Shop's which do import's such kind of part's from other countries and hence your vehicle will be legal to drive happily Understand ed or I had to explain in more detail's
--> Raja sahab, the moment your car's hood will be lifted, it would take only a minute or so to classify your vehicle's body / frame as non custom paid. Please remember that when you replace the body / frame, it has its own distinct set of numbers and the chassis has its own numbers. When your vehicle is registered by Excise, the chassis and frame numbers are listed on the documents. When you produce a set of documents that has a different body / frame number than what is physically present, it takes only a minute to realise what the problem is. Also, if you try matching the frame number to the Excise documents by tampering, that would make your vehicle liable to outright confiscation. There is NO exception to this rule, not even in a court of law since the court decides on questions of law and Customs decides on questions of fact. If Customs reports that your vehicle is tampered, then it is tampered and you just cannot challenge this in any court of law.
Moving on, let's suppose that a vehicle with a body change is apprehended by Customs. As Raja sahab mentioned above, the next step is to go for forensics. If the forensic report rules out tampering of the chassis, the owner of the vehicle will be fined (and may be liable to penalties on discretion of Customs) and will have to pay applicable duties and taxes too. The use of a Bill of Entry, as mentioned by Raja Sahab, is very appropriate except that your local kabaria is not authorized to import used bodies / frames since this is against the Import Policy Order right now. In the past, the import of used bodies / frames was allowed but not anymore so please keep this in mind when going for a body / frame swap. You can only buy a body / frame outside Pakistan (most probably in Afghanistan's scrap markets) and then import it through a land route, which incidentally will give you a Bill of Entry of such goods. After paying applicable duties and taxes, based on appraisment of the used body / frame, you can now replace the body / frame. There is some confusion produced here - kabarias are selling such bodies / frames, although illegally, using fake receipts from Afghanistan. Today, this might get the job done but a few years down the line, a policy change on the issue might cause such vehicle owners sizable trouble.
As a general rule of thumb, avoid body / frame swap vehicles unless you have a lot of spare time to roam around in adjudication and appeals. For others who still want a body / frame swap, I'm always up for questions.
Hope this helps. Please feel free to put up any queries.
Fahad Bashir,
Assistant Collector, Pakistan Customs.
