31% of surveyed firms in Vietnam pay bribes for customs procedures
/On April 27, 2017, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) released the results of a 2016 survey that shows 31% of businesses admitted to paying "under the table" fees for customs procedures.
The survey was released in cooperation with Vietnam Customs and shows a slight increase from the 2015 survey when 28% of respondents indicated they paid customs bribes. Some of the interesting results from the survey respondents include:
- 17% said they would experience customs procedure delays if they did not pay the bribe
- 81% indicated that the inspection times were long
- 72% said information sharing among agencies was not good
Both the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016 (CPI) and the Trace Matrix 2016 (TM) rank Vietnam as a high risk for bribery. CPI ranks Vietnam 113 out of 176 countries and TM ranks Vietnam 175 out of 199 countries for bribery risk.
The survey results demonstrate the necessity of having awareness of the markets in which your company operates as well as having a good compliance program in place that includes risk based diligence of your third parties.
Often bribery risk for a corporation will arise from third party vendors who are facilitating transactions on your behalf. Customs brokers should be part of any good third party due diligence program.
GCSG offers a variety of due diligence services and reports and utilizes a risk based ranking method to help our clients develop a tailored approach to their third party due diligence program. Contact us at info@globalcompliancesg.com with any additional question's or for more information on how we can help you with your third party due diligence program.
