Customs resumes electronic auction of seized goods

Almost two years after the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) suspended its electronic auction exercise over technical hitches, the service on Monday announced that the electronic portal is now open for interested persons with valid Tax Identification Number (TIN) to bid for items of their choice.

Public Relations Officer of NCS, Joseph Attah, in a statement said the bidding period for every week is 48 hours, beginning from Monday 12noon to Wednesday 12noon.

The statement reads, “Following the re-engineering of the Nigeria Customs Service e-auction process, the electronic portal is now opened (live) for interested persons with valid Tax Identification Number (TIN) to log in and bid for items of their choice.

“As usual, the bidding period for every week is 48 hours, beginning from Monday 12noon to Wednesday 12noon.

“Please note that the process is fully automated and requires no physical intervention of any kind to win.

“While you choose and make your bid along side other interested Nigerians, we wish you good luck.”

Recall that the service on July 3, 2017, introduced an electronic platform to conduct auction of seized vehicles away from the old manual auction of goods at the ports and border stations amid malpractices.

The online auction, however, recorded little success due to what the Service described as technical issues experienced with the system.

The last phase of the auction had only 806 vehicles uploaded on the platform, and bought by 753 bidders. It generated about N346.1 million. Another phase began in May last year, but did not last before it was eventually suspended due to the challenges.

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