1. The competent authorities of the Member States shall notify the Commission of the quantities covered by the requests for import authorisations which they have received.
2. The Commission shall notify its confirmation that the requested quantities are available for importation in the chronological order in which the notifications of the Member States have been received (‘first come, first served’ basis).
3. Where there is reason to believe that anticipated requests may exceed the quantitative limits, the Commission may, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3), divide the quantitative limits into tranches or fix maximum amounts per allocation. The Commission may, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3), reserve a proportion of a specific quantitative limit for requests supported by evidence of past import performance.
4. The notifications referred to in paragraphs 1 and 2 shall be communicated electronically within the integrated network set up for this purpose, unless for imperative technical reasons it is necessary to use other means of communication temporarily.
5. The competent authorities shall notify the Commission immediately after being informed of any quantity that is not used during the validity of the import authorisation. Such unused quantities shall automatically be transferred into the remaining quantities of the total Union quantitative limit.
6. The Commission may, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3), take any measure necessary to implement this Article.
1. All Union importers, regardless of where they are established in the Union, may submit authorisation applications to the competent authority of the Member State of their choice.
2. For the purposes of the second sentence of Article 17(3), importers' applications shall, where necessary, be accompanied by documentary evidence of previous imports for each category and each third country concerned.
The competent authorities of the Member States shall issue import authorisations within 5 working days of notification of the Commission decision or within the time limit set by the Commission.
Those authorities shall inform the Commission that import authorisations have been issued within 10 working days of issuing the authorisations.
Where necessary and in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3), import authorisations may be made conditional upon the lodging of a security.
1. Without prejudice to measures taken under Article 16, import authorisations shall authorise the import of products which are subject to quantitative limits and shall be valid throughout the territory in which the Treaty is applied under the conditions laid down in the Treaty, regardless of the place of import mentioned in the applications by importers.
When the Union introduces temporary limits for one or more of its regions, in accordance with Article 16, those limits shall not preclude the importation into the region(s) concerned of products shipped before the date of introduction of those limits.
2. The period of validity of import authorisations issued by the competent authorities of the Member States shall be 6 months. This period of validity may be modified where necessary, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3).
3. Applications for import authorisations shall be drawn up on forms conforming to a specimen the characteristics of which shall be established in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3). The competent authorities may, under the conditions fixed by them, allow application documents to be submitted by electronic means. However, all documents and evidence shall be available to the competent authorities.
4. Import authorisations may be issued by electronic means at the request of the importer concerned. At the duly motivated request of that importer, and provided that paragraph 3 has been complied with, an import authorisation issued by electronic means may be replaced by an import authorisation in paper form by the competent authority of the same Member State which issued the original import authorisation. However, that authority shall only issue an import authorisation in written form after having ensured that the authorisation by electronic means has been cancelled.
Any measure necessary to implement this paragraph may be adopted in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3).
5. At the request of the Member State concerned, textile products in the possession of the competent authorities of that Member State, particularly in the context of bankruptcy or similar procedures, for which a valid import authorisation is no longer available, may be released into free circulation in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3).
Without prejudice to the specific provisions to be adopted in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3), import authorisations shall not be loaned or transferred, whether for a consideration or free of charge, by the person in whose name the document was issued.
The validity of import authorisations which are wholly or partly unused may be extended, if enough quantities are available, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 30(3).
The competent authorities of the Member States shall inform the Commission, within 30 days following the end of each month, of the quantities of products subject to Union quantitative limits which have been imported during the preceding month.
Source: EUR-Lex (Publications Office of the EU), © European Union, reuse permitted under Commission Decision 2011/833/EU.
