During this morning’s CBSA systems update call, participants were still reporting inconsistent and very slow processing times and challenges in managing the backlogs. Particular issues were flagged regarding S12 transmission, IID processing and data integrity.
CBSA has just issued the following status report on their system issues:
IT groups are still working on the backlog. The backlog started to go down last night after the marine transactions were set aside with additional ones received this morning. The current backlog of documents overall is approximately 50,600 and there was delay spike at 0640 AM that is being investigated.
- The workaround for the problematic set of marine transactions was developed, tested and successfully implemented
- Approximately 14,000 marine transactions have been set aside
- The SWI / CFIA was at 3,800 this morning vs 47k last night so the SWIs did drop significantly. Still a delay in receiving CFIA decision.
- Overall there has been significant improvements and a high processing rate is restored.
- The problematic marine transactions will be kept aside in order to clear the current backlog
- Once the backlog is cleared (currently estimated at sometime tomorrow), staggered reintegration of the problematic marine transactions will be performed and carefully monitored and analysed
- In-depth analysis is continuing to pin point root cause of the problem and implement remedial actions
Operational Impacts for Digital Facilitation and Support Services Division (DFSSD):
DFSSD teams continue to send internal and external bulletins to apprise clients of system issue as well as highlight the E-Longroom option to Trade.
TCCU (External Client Support) :
TCCU has been experiencing high call and email volumes. Longest wait time for a call back has been approximately 1.5 hours.
During the last 48 hours , the TCCU has have create 562 tickets total from external client inquires (email and telephone)
During After hours on Nov 03/04 we had 65 calls
During After hours on Nov 04/05 we had 42 calls
We have additional staff providing backup
Summary of types of inquiries we are receiving are a mixture of
- regular calls (document rejects) however higher amount than normal because of R856 increased validation,
- higher amount of status inquiries primarily due to the delay.
- Increased inquiries from clients asking what they should do in which we refer them to the system outage contingency plan and explain that they can present paper at the border.
- outreach as required to inform clients that CBSA IT could not process the transaction due to a system issue and clients should use a new transaction number
ICSU (Internal Client Support Unit)
During the last 48 hours ICSU has opened 127 tickets and out of them, 31 were during the night.
ICSU has been in regular contact with Ports in the regions to assess impacts and provide ACROSS guidance:
Latest updates received this morning November 05:
- Windsor (0453): Big delay in processing incoming drivers, there are hundreds of trucks waiting to cross the border. Once they have crossed, there is another delay with CFIA who are also trying to catch up on processing (at least an extra 2 hours for the drivers). Workload for BSOs has tripled.
- Emerson (0502): Port is managing as an outage, holding all the paper copies. There is no backlog or delay of trucks. The paperwork clearance is very large. Carriers are calling concerned about their release notifications.
- Lacolle (0351): Catching-up slowly. Still a line-up at primary and around 20 trucks still waiting in the yard. Waiting time is about 15 minutes. Note they are presently at their minimum staff, at 8h00 more booths will be opened when regular staff is on site.
Next Steps:
The internal and external client support teams will continue to collaborate with different CBSA teams to refine bulletin/information messaging where required and provide those updates to internal/external clients.