Help
Using the platform
Getting around SCMTR, from signing in to a filed declaration — and what to do when something does not behave the way you expected.
Check your CSN against the line’s SAM first
Why a mismatch is free to fix before the line files its SAM and an IGM amendment after it, what SCMTR checks at Sign & upload (the MBL PDF too), when your CSN is due and how you are reminded, which SCA changes make the line file an SAA, and how a line shares its SAM, names its forwarders and sets its cut-off.
The pending console split-ups board
The consolidators’ register of master bills whose house bills the shipping line has not yet split onto the manifest, as a public board: what each row’s “Our findings” means — still pending, partly linked, linked on customs’ record, no CSN yet, not on record — read from customs’ public record daily and on the owner’s Check now, what the record cannot show, how a member adds and changes their own bills, and the Excel and PDF downloads anyone can take.
CSN cut-offs from the shipping lines
What a shipping line’s CSN cut-off is and why it matters, where to find it for your vessel on the cut-off board — with the customs VCN, port VCN, rotation and VIA numbers to copy, customs’ own record of the call and what moved — which VCN goes in the CSN, how current a cut-off is, calls read from JNPA’s reports and Maersk’s lists with estimated cut-offs, and how a line publishes its own by e-mail or from its desk.
The vessel call number (VCN)
The conveyance reference on a CSN, end to end: the three places a VCN comes to you from and why you never apply for one, when the port issues it and how far ahead of arrival calls have been seen to appear, why a placeholder is not an option, which of a delay, a roll and a blanked sailing takes it away, what is checked on your behalf and what customs is actually asked, what that answer does and does not prove, and what to do for a draft and for a filing customs has already accepted.
Finding the ship you are filing for
A bill of lading names a ship; customs identifies it by number. How to find the right hull from a name, how to look a ship up with VCN search without a filing, how to tell two ships with one name apart, why a rename changes nothing on the filing, which of a feeder and a mother vessel you declare, what to put on a bill that says TBN, and what to do when the search finds nothing — or finds the ship and no IMO number at all.
Signing your filing with your DSC
Customs accepts nothing unsigned. How Sign & upload signs a filing with your DSC token through the scmtr DSC Signer, how to install and update the Signer, what the authorised representative PAN is, what to do when a DSC is renewed, what the file check verifies about a signed file’s DSC, what “DSC validation failed” means, and every way signing fails with what to do about it.
Working with a shipping line filing (SAM / SDM)
Open a shipping line’s SACHM23 manifest — hundreds of bills, over a megabyte — as a searchable table, correct a line with the full editor, see what the file contradicts about itself, save it and come back — a re-dropped file reopens the saved copy, and a newer one asks before replacing it — and write it back exactly as it came — or, since 12 September 2026, sign it and file it from here, through the same gate that keeps a file from going to customs twice.
Filing a SAM or SDM when you have no software for it
Build a SAM / SDM from nothing, for a bulk, tanker, break-bulk or tramp call that no liner system files for: what you need before you start (the IMO number, the VCN the terminal applies for, your ASC or ASA registration, the unpublished terminal operator code customs checks, the crew list’s e-Sanchit IRN), the order the four filings go in, when a non-containerised arrival manifest is actually due against a containerised one, the ten questions asked per bill of lading and the conventions written for you from real bulk filings — and why the app creates the manifest but customs, not the app, decides whether it is accepted.
What the app’s checks mean
Red stops the filing, amber does not. What each tier is, why something is marked amber rather than red, every amber finding the app raises and the evidence behind it — and the two fixes the form will not accept in the obvious form.
SCMTR JSON upload
Drop a CSN, an ACK, a structural-failure response or a SAM / SDM on the CSN filing page and have it checked against the real schema, the rules for its reporting event and customs’ error list — including why pairing an ACK with its declaration is the step worth taking, and how the screen names the CSN you need and rejects one that is not it; and the free check at scmtr.io/check — what it shows without an account, the BL-tracking link under each master bill, what a signed file does and does not hold, and that signing in creates the account.
Checking a manifest against ICEGATE
Ask customs which of a manifest’s bills already carry an accepted CSN and how they compare, each difference marked Fix, Check or OK to differ — what each verdict means, why “no CSN” is not a fault, why the check paces itself, and the IEC-typed consignee codes it asks customs’ IE-code register about (a note, never a verdict) — and how to tell customs took an entry inward (SEI).
My VCNs: every filing on one vessel call
One page per VCN — one ship’s call at one port, with the rotation number beside it — where your CSNs, every SAM upload and its ACK, and the files you or customs have shown for it come together, appearing on its own the moment a filing or a kept file first names the VCN.
Why is my container held?
The VCN page’s Bills and containers board — every bill and container of yours on the ship, worst status first, with the one next step for each: CSN not on record, a difference from the manifest, an amended CSN, or ready.
Customs rejected my SAM — which bills, and why?
A SAM rejection names most lines by number only. Explain this rejection resolves every rejected line to its bill on customs’ public record, compares it with the CSN it quotes, and says in one sentence whether it is a data error at all.
Amending a shipping line filing (SAA or SDA)
What a minimal amendment carries — only the lines that changed, never the whole manifest again — what amdType means, how SCMTR builds one from the manifest you already hold, and the sequence when a forwarder asks you to amend for their consolidation: the deletion step ICES Advisory 38/2026 publishes — “delete SAM” is the bill’s own line item, dropped and re-added, never the manifest — why a straight↔consolidated change, a consolidator PAN or a CSN reference is never an in-place update, when the jurisdictional officer has to approve it, and how an SAA or SDA is checked against the newest accepted reply kept for the call before it is sent; and counting the manifest customs holds from ICEGATE’s public record, with no login, to check an amendment against it.
Replacing a CSN that has left customs’ record
When a CSN cannot simply be amended — deleted, off customs’ record, or the manifest holds the bill under a different date — Start a replacement begins a new CSN from the old one, changing only the field at fault.
Signing in
There are no passwords. Sign in with Google, with a Microsoft work account, or with an emailed link — request it on your laptop, approve it on your phone, and the laptop is what ends up signed in. What the confirmation code is for, and what to do when a link expires or never arrives.
Your team, and filing for other companies
Admins, members and managers; who reports to whom; letting only signers send to ICEGATE; a person’s own ICEGATE user ID; allowing only company e-mail addresses. And for filing agents: asking a company to let you file for it or setting up one new to SCMTR, account leads and handlers, working inside a client, and how a company changes its agent whenever it likes while keeping every filing.
Using SCMTR
Signing in through to a filed declaration: organizations and roles, every route into a filing, what a row on the CSN filing list shows and what its badges mean, statuses, and admin abilities.
Checking files by e-mail
Send a CSN or an ICEGATE acknowledgement to the checking address and get the full check back — a CSN and its reply read together so every error names your own value, which of your filings a reply answers, a button that opens the right screen without ever recording anything, ICEGATE’s refusal e-mails, and your own checking address for forwarding ICEGATE’s replies automatically.
Bills by e-mail
E-mail a master bill of lading and its house bills and get the Sea Cargo Manifest Checklist back — what to attach, the three replies and the four steps they show, the few things you are asked (the CFS, DPD or depot; a consignee’s PAN; a missing master) and why only those, the page that asks them with no sign-in, what approving does, and what is kept.
E-mail from SCMTR
Every message the platform can send you and why you got it — sign-in links, invitations and their daily limits, CSN alerts, check reports, the notices about a filing something outside SCMTR has changed, the privacy-change notice, and the only two you can switch off — plus what to do when one has not arrived.
Sending a CSN to the line, the CFS and your customer
Emailing a CSN to the line, the CFS or your customer — a filed one with its declaration and acknowledgement attached, a draft before it goes, or a file you only checked here; what goes in the message, who is copied, pasting addresses out of Outlook, the shareable link and how to withdraw it.
After you file
The gap between "sent" and "settled": the three ways a customs outcome can reach you, what "Filed — not auto-tracked" means, why a filing with no tracking id is answered only by email to your registered ICEGATE address, how long to wait, how to record the outcome once you have it — by dropping the emailed acknowledgement onto the filing, or by hand — and what the filing page says, and what is emailed to you, when customs no longer lists the call it names. Also why the same file will not go to ICEGATE twice and how to send it anyway with a reason, what "Delivery unconfirmed" means, and what a held filing means.
Troubleshooting
Symptoms in the words someone would use to describe them, and what to do about each.
Asking for a feature
Where a suggestion goes, what happens to it, what the roadmap statuses mean, and why a signed-in vote counts for more than an anonymous one.
Looking for the regulation rather than the product?
The SCMTR reference covers fields, codes, identifiers, and rejection reasons. The filing guide is the plain-language walkthrough.