The Georgia Revenue Service (GRS) has conducted three Time Release Study (TRS) on a periodic basis since 2013. GRS carried out its last TRS on Customs Procedures in 2019 and as of today, GRS plans to conduct its fourth TRS by the end of 2022.

In preparation for the fourth TRS, the GRS requested the World Customs Organization’s (WCO) assistance through a virtual Workshop as a refresher session on the WCO’s TRS Guide to familiarize the core group of Customs officials who will be involved in conducting the TRS, . Another key expectation was to understand the new updates and elements considered in the TRS Guide, Version 3, 2018, compared to its previous edition. Accordingly, the WCO successfully delivered a two-day virtual TRS Workshop for the GRS from 10 to 11 May 2022.

The two-day Workshop was facilitated by the WCO Secretariat with assistance from a WCO TRS Accredited Technical and Operational Adviser (TOA) from the Royal Malaysia Customs Department. The WCO expert, not only provided a comprehensive technical information to the GRS Customs officials on the TRS methodology and the use of the WCO TRS Software, but also shared practical experiences, which added more valuable knowledge to the Workshop. Furthermore, the Workshop allowed the WCO expert and the GRS Customs officials to share views in relation to Customs procedures carried out by GRS.

The participants to the Workshop were largely (90%) represented by female participants and were senior Customs officials, Analyst and Advisors. The GRS participants expressed a strong desire to conduct their fourth TRS in order to maintain the good momentum. On this front, the WCO reassured its support to GRS to successfully conduct another TRS in the near future.