In Part 2 of this podcast series, our co-hosts continue the conversation with Asendia USA guests Leslie Foxhoven, Executive Director of Latin America & the Caribbean, and Michael DiVincenzo, Product Manager, the group dives right into why choosing the right customs broker is critical for shipping into Mexico.

With constant tariff and regulatory changes, the wrong broker can mean:

❌ Delays

❌ Confiscated shipments

❌ Even blacklisting at customs

Our guests break down Mexico’s RFC tax ID requirement—what it means for shippers, and how Asendia can support clients with both T1 informal and A1 formal clearances to stay compliant and keep parcels moving.

Bottom line: a compliance-first approach protects your business and your customers.

Check back next week for part 3 of 4 mini episodes on this must-have service to grow your business further.

Click here to download our Mexico e-commerce e-book.

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Leslie Foxhoven | LinkedIn

Leslie is responsible for designing and establishing Asendia’s best in class e-commerce network solutions to Latin America. She has over 35 years of entrepreneurial experience in the e-commerce industry while living and working in Latin America, establishing companies and networks, including linehaul, final mile delivery, return centers, customs clearance, regional sales, and bottom line results.

Michael DiVincenzo | LinkedIn

Michael is responsible for the development, performance, and expansion of Asendia’s e-commerce solutions into Latin America. He has 9 years of experience in the e-commerce industry with prior experience working as a Pricing Analyst and Commercial Services Analyst for Asendia USA.

Learn more about this topic:

• Download Mexico’s Growing e-Commerce Market e-book

First of all, Asendia, you know, we are 100% compliant everywhere. It's super important to us to be compliant globally.

So the most important thing we, we want to ensure is that our broker is somebody trust is somebody that really knows the law.

This is Outside the Box with Asendia USA, a podcast educating US based brands, marketplaces and e tailers on international shipping topics and how they can expand their global e commerce footprint

Back to another episode of Outside the Box with Asendia USA podcast where we continue the conversation where we left off last week. Jason, you had some questions I think on the customs broker or something?

Yeah.

So Leslie, as you and I have kind of gone through a lot of the development of this network going down into, into Mexico, we've been dealing with a lot of vendors and, and, and different agreements between the different parties. So can you kind of explain to us what that relationship with the customs broker is like and why it's so important to what you guys have set up?

Yeah, Abs, I mean, over the years, over, you know, the last 20 years, well, most of the customs broker just kind of did everything day to day.

Nothing really changed and nobody was really investigating anything going on more than, you know, the usual, the usual ad hoc investigations and, and customs.

But the reason it's so important to have an excellent broker and more important now with all the, all the tariffs changes and everything is that, you know, first of all, Cyndia, you know, we are 100% compliant everywhere. It's super important to us to be compliant globally.

So the most important thing we, we want to ensure is that our broker is somebody trust is somebody that really knows the law. And the test, there's really a test this time because the law has changed so many times.

As we all know with the tariff changes since August, the brokers are just all on their toes and running.

And some brokers, which we don't really understand why, have been a more lackadaisical, if you will, in getting to the law quicker, knowing though that the risk is if they don't interpret the law fast and tell their clients that, that they really run the risk of, of losing their license or getting their license suspended. And they're very hard to come by. So it's super important.

And our broker has proven himself and of course we have, you know, multiple brokers that, you know, we always want to talk to and keep, and keep each other honest and informed. But you know, it's important to sit with Hacienda, to sit with Customs and go over the interpretations of the law.

And make certain that what you understand is what's going to happen because we don't want, you know, next new client or somebody else's new client to get caught the minutia and the regulations of somebody interpreting law wrong. So yeah, that's one.

So from, from my side of the house on the legal compliance side, it's so great to see that our partners are willing to go that extra mile to make sure they're compliant to go through with the different auditing. That's response they have to do to, that goes along with, with that compliance and that government oversight.

So for me it makes my life easy when we're able to connect with vendors who have compliance first mentality.

Yeah. And I, I guess I, I look at it too and this is for, for either Mike or Leslie. But.

And this may just be an easy serve up but it again, it's just good to educate too. But you mentioned some of the brokers that are taking a little bit more of a laxadaisical approach.

What is the impact on clearance and delivery when it comes to material coming into Mexico then if you're working with a broker that has a more la.

Yeah, well, I mean the repercussions are many things that you can set up your API and set up your business relationship with a customer, I mean with a broker and then you know, without them doing their homework, they lose their license or they're suspended and now you've got to withdraw everything you've done and find another option. And so that, that's, that's, that's one of the things.

But the, the other issue is that if you are not compliant and you're not, you're not getting the right information from the customer, I mean from the broker, you can get, you know, you can have your products. What's, what's that word? Taken. And you can, you can have them held. But more importantly. That's funny. I can't think that's okay.

I know, it's like I was just like man, I'm digging deep here too. The same thing happened to me earlier today too. I don't know, back to school. Who knows what is it? But, yeah, but.

Confiscated.

There it is. Okay.

Your products, confiscated. And you can get on the blacklist at customs where they'll be watching for your labels in the future and you won't be able to.

Yeah, don't forget it.

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Blacklist at Custom Sounds like a scary place to be. Okay. All right. Interesting.

All right, well, keeping with the compliance theme, one of my favorite topics with Mexico has been as I'm bringing new clients on, is if maybe again Mike or Leslie. So the ability to manage RFIC requirements. Right. It's an important topic and I want to talk.

I know we talked about it in the previous episode, but let's refresh everybody on what the RFC IC requirement is and then what is our ability? What abilities or, you know, capabilities do we have to customize solutions for clients with this requirement?

Sure.

So back in, I guess, the last part of the fourth quarter, Mexican custom, Mexican customs came up and they gave us the requirement for all shippers coming into Mexico.

Like you'll see in Brazil and many other large countries that they're requiring the tax ID and the tax ID of the consignee so that they can monitor what that particular consignee is bringing into the country. So people were scrambling and doing their best and most people did not have that tax id.

So we worked really hard with our partners in Mexico and within our team to come up with a way to support our customers who did not have those. And I'm really proud of our extended team. I think everybody's done a really great job of supporting those customers who don't have those.

But the rule is you need them. We have had some competitors who send memorandums out that say that they're not required, but they are.

You might find a place in customs where you can get them through again, where customs aren't paying attention, something like that. And you can get by. But the law clearly says that you do need a tax ID or you also need a Curb Population Identification Number.

And that's for people who are under 18. And those are also assigned. So if Nick knows this, Nick's got a customer now who's shipping a formal clearance. So if. Let me go back to that.

If you're shipping a T1, which is an informal clearance, then each individual consignee can give their, their tax IDs, but if you have a more of a formal clearance and you're shipping in tons of many items that are going to, you know, people for marketing or various reasons, we are able to support you with A, with A, A1 formal clearance and we're able to rent, if you will, and, and offer the, the tax ID of our broker or whatever free trading company we find for our customer. So those are ways that we can support.

Awesome. And which I, and I am greatly appreciative of the solutions that you guys have found. So thank you. Okay. Very good. Transit times.

Yes.

Go ahead, Jason.

Back on to, I guess the Laredo facility a little bit when you talked about transit times. So, Mike, where are we. Where did we start with transit times? Where have we gotten it to? And have we been able to improve our experience at all?

Yeah, absolutely. And just before we get on the solution that we're.

That Leslie and I have built over the past year or so, the reason why we, we started to do this was because of the boom in Latin America and the amount of E commerce purchases that have been happening within Mexico from different countries, especially the U.S. so previously, before we set up this direct to Mexico solution, we were seeing roughly 15 business days or 21 calendar days, depending on which metric you like. More from the time we were processing the parcels to the time they're getting delivered.

And I'm very happy to say that since we launched our direct to Mexico service, we've been seeing about eight business days to 11 calendar days from the processing to the delivery. So we were able to cut our transits in half, I am happy to say.

The, from a cost and the rates we're able to provide our customers, they're much cheaper than what we had before. So I think we've definitely set ourselves up to provide our customers a great experience on both transit and price.

To.

Just build on that.

Across all of our facilities, no matter where they are, from Los Angeles to JFK and Ord, we're seeing about 95 to 98% of the parcels delivered within 10 business days. So I know what I was speaking to before was averages.

But all, just about all the parcels are getting delivered within a little over a week, which we're very thrilled and very proud of.

On top of that, yeah, that's a massive difference. That 50 is a massive cut. In terms of transit times. What is, what was the biggest chunk, right? Was it front end on getting it to Laredo?

Was it the customs clearance part? But where, where did you guys find the biggest savings in terms of transit time.

I would think it's. It could be a plethora of things because as we all know as parcels, especially in international shipping, there's a lot of different legs.

So it's hard to say to pinpoint in one place, but one of the most common places where transits can get extended in Mexico is customs clearance.

And I think the fact that we've been using Laredo as a gateway, we have a great relationship with our broker and he has a great relationship with the Mexican customs authorities in Laredo.

We've been able to cut our customs clearance times between 24 and 48 hours, which I think is a huge testament to why we were able to see such quicker transit times over the past year.

That's incredible. And Mike, I just want to add to that the, the other side of the coin is that those are those transit times x our facilities throughout the usa.

So for those clients who are getting it, getting that product directly to Laredo, our transit times are, are much quicker than that. So just just to clarify the origin.

Site, I can even. Yeah, and I could jump in on that too.

I mean, even this, this client who's, you know, really right smack in the middle of the country, if you will, you know, that they ship into Laredo and then from processing, the average that I saw for about a six week period is it's like 7.25 days. Right.

And I mean that, that's phenomenal and that's with a very high tolerance of deliveries, you know, and that's even, you know, going even further in terms of every time we've processed the, the, you know, this particular job for this client, things continue to be more efficient and more effective in terms of deliveries and everything else that you guys do.

So, yeah, the service is great compared to especially and I can just blanket statement, the service is great, but you have to look at what was available previously to actually say the service is really great. So good job to you guys on that as well.

Thank you for listening. Tune in again next week when we continue this discussion.

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