House bills missing from the line’s manifest

The consignment arrives under one master bill of lading. Underneath it are your house bills, one per importer. Until each house bill is on the arrival manifest customs holds, the importer behind it cannot file a Bill of Entry against it. This page is the forwarder's or consolidator's side of getting them there.

It is a live problem rather than a settled procedure, so this page marks what is published by customs, what is our own reading, and what nobody has established. Where it says nobody knows, that is the honest state of it and not a gap in this page. The six questions customs answered on 21 September 2026, one by one, are on ICES Advisory 38/2026: the six FAQs.

Why are my house bills missing from the manifest now?

Until 12 August 2026 there was a way round: a supplementary IGM, filed by e-mail or on paper, appended what the manifest had missed. That route is closed. JNCH Public Notice 97/2026: from that date supplementary IGM/EGM filings are "no longer … accepted either electronically through e-mail or in physical form", and any amendment goes "only through the prescribed SCMTR amendment messages" — SAA for an arrival manifest, SDA for a departure one.

The underlying squeeze is upstream of you. Carriers commonly close the CSN on the day the vessel sails from the origin port, which on a short transit can be before the consolidator has the house bill details to file. No CSN exists, so the line's manifest has nothing to reference, and the house bills never reach it.

What do I do — and does it depend on how late I am?

There are three windows, not two, and which one you are in decides both how much work it is and who has to do it. The question is not whether a CSN exists — it is has the line filed its SAM, and has the vessel come inward?

This table is the process CBIC's SCMTR team set out for the trade. Its three windows and the berthing boundary between the two later ones are published in no circular, advisory or public notice — treat those as practice reported from customs, not a rule you can cite. Its deletion step is, since 21 September 2026, published for the console case by ICES Advisory 38/2026 — with the drop inside the SAA itself — below.

The step almost everybody misses is the deletion. In both of the later windows, what the line has already filed has to be deleted before the corrected picture can go in. An SAA simply filed on top, with nothing deleted first, is the likeliest explanation we have for a split that "goes in" and changes nothing. You cannot do it yourself: it is the line's action, on its own ICEGATE login.

It is one line, not the manifest — our reading, and since 21 September 2026 a well-founded one. ICES Advisory 38/2026 (DGoS, ICES), answering exactly this question — house bills to be added after the SAM where the master went in as a straight bill — has the line "first drop (delete) the existing Straight BL line item and subsequently re-add the Master BL configured as consolidated, linking the reference details of the CSN and House BL provided by the forwarder" (Q1, Scenario A), and its Q2 calls the same thing "the amendment deletion procedure". What the advisory drops is the bill's own line item, inside the SAA, and what drops it is an SAA carrying amendment type D on that line. The phrase "delete SAM" itself is the reported process's, not the advisory's, and reading Q1 as its meaning is our inference — one this page reached from the message set before the advisory: SACHM23 has no deletion message at all — its six events are SAM, SAA, SDM, SEI, SDA and SDN — so there was never a file a line could send to withdraw a manifest, and an SAA amends a SAM and so needs one to exist. That reasoning is still what the reading rests on; the advisory's procedure is what it agrees with. If your line is worried you are asking them to withdraw a whole vessel's manifest, Q1 of ICES Advisory 38/2026 is the paragraph to send them. The mechanics from their side, step by step, are on Amending a shipping line filing.

Say it the advisory's way in the request, too. "Please drop our line item and re-add it as consolidated against CSN … of …" and "please withdraw the manifest" land very differently on a line's documentation desk, and the process this page's table comes from says only "delete SAM" — so use the words that name the line item.

That is also why the advice circulating in the trade — "file the CSN after the SAM if you did not file it before" — is incomplete rather than wrong. The process CBIC's SCMTR team set out has that step in its middle window, after the line has deleted what it filed. No published notice sanctions it, Advisory 37/2026 has the CSN filed before the SAM, and nothing on record shows customs accepting one. ICES Advisory 38/2026 does not settle it either: its Scenario A asks only whether a CSN exists when the line amends, not when it was filed. Here, Sign & upload refuses a fresh CSN while customs' record still shows the line's manifest covering the bill — so confirm the deletion shows on BL tracking before you file.

A plain amendment is the same shape, with one difference at the start. If you are correcting a CSN rather than splitting a consolidation, then before the SAM is filed you need not tell the line at all: the CSN reference does not change, and the corrected data is picked up when the SAM is eventually filed. After the SAM exists, it is the same delete-then-SAA sequence, and the same officer approval once the vessel is inward.

Where no CSN was filed in time at all, ICES Advisory 37/2026 puts the job on the line directly: "In case, CSN was not filed before SAM submission, the HBL details can be added by the shipping line through SAA(splitting of BLs)." The same advisory asks lines to batch these — "compile all such amendment requests and thereafter file the consolidated SAA to avoid duplication of work & system traffic" — which is a real reason your line may not turn a request round the same hour. ICES Advisory 38/2026 (Q1, Scenario B) says what that SAA carries: with no CSN holding the house bills, the line puts "the full underlying House BL details within the houseCargoDec object" — the house bills in full, parties, ports and goods included. That is the one case in which a full house row is what customs asks for; once a CSN exists it is the opposite, as the next section but one explains.

Does it need an officer's approval?

Only once the vessel is inward — not before. A version of this process circulating in the trade states officer approval unconditionally, and that is wrong. ICES Advisory 37/2026's table is explicit: the three scenarios before entry inward need no approval; the two after it do, on both messages. The process CBIC's SCMTR team set out for the trade draws the line in the same place — approval belongs to the "post SAM and vessel inward" column and to no other.

So the single most useful thing you can do is be early, and the two earlier windows are genuinely different from each other rather than one lump: before the SAM this costs you a filing and an e-mail; after the SAM but before berthing it costs a deletion and an SAA as well, and you are waiting on the line; once the vessel is inward it joins an officer's queue on top of all of that.

What happens after entry inward is itself unsettled — the manifest guide's errors 373/374 read as a flat refusal while the advisory says approval is available. See Is SCMTR mandatory at my port yet? for both sides of that and the pending-approval codes.

What does the line need from me?

Every carrier that publishes a requirement asks for the same thing, and the ones that are most specific ask for two parts, not one: the CSN number and its date. Some ask for the PCIN beside it; two ask for the CSN file or its acknowledgement rather than the number.

No carrier anywhere asks for an MCIN, a job number, a job date or an SCA reference, and none publishes an amendment-request form. The channel is usually ODeX; some lines take it by e-mail to their import documentation desk.

If the SAM is already filed, the reference is not the whole ask. Say plainly that your bill's line item has to be dropped and re-added as consolidated — ICES Advisory 38/2026's own words — not updated in place. That is the step the corrected picture depends on and it is not something the reference implies: a request saying only "please file an SAA against CSN 1400001 of 18/09" can be actioned in a way that changes nothing, and one that asks for the line to be updated asks for something the advisory says the system refuses (see below).

Get the number and date from the acknowledgement that granted them, not from your own notes — a date that is a day or two out gets the line's amendment refused against your CSN (164, with 232/233 following it). On any accepted filing here, Send CSN reference to the carrier (under Export & share on the filing's page) produces a reference card carrying the CSN number and date, the MCIN and every house bill, built from the newest accepted version.

What can the line's amendment carry, and what must it leave out?

This is where a well-intentioned amendment gets refused, and it is worth understanding before you chase the line for a second attempt.

Customs' stated procedure — ICES Advisory 38/2026, Q1 Scenario A — and what it leaves to a reading. The line drops the straight line item and re-adds the master bill "configured as consolidated, linking the reference details of the CSN and House BL provided by the forwarder". That is all the advisory says; what a house row then carries is not its words. Read with customs' own Trade Scenarios table, and on our reading, that is a master line quoting your CSN, with house rows that carry each house bill's own reference, its prior reference, its customs location and its containers — and not the transport document or the item details: the parties, ports and goods the CSN customs already holds. Send those again and customs answers 370 ("redundant house details") on the line and 118 on every house bill — and refuses the whole thing. That is the opposite of the natural reading of 370: the code is not saying "no house bills here", it is saying "not these parts of them".

What is on record, stated honestly beside it. No acknowledgement on record yet shows that shape accepted. The only shape seen to pass customs' checks is a house-less one — the master line quoting your CSN alone, with no house rows — and the only refusals on record are of the full shape, house rows re-sending the transport document and the items. So the thin shape is the Trade Scenarios table's and our reading of the advisory's "linking the reference details" — not the advisory's words — and not yet a proven one; the house-less shape is the one that has passed, and whether the advisory's wording covers it is not settled either way. If a line tells you its SAA was refused with 370, there are two ways out: the thin shape, or the shape that has passed.

Changing what a line is means drop and re-add, says the advisory (the one reply since raised no code for a reference changed in place). ICES Advisory 38/2026 Q2: changing a bill "from Straight to Consolidated (or vice-versa)", changing the consolidator PAN, or changing the previous reference (CSN / PCIN / MCIN) as an in-place update "is prohibited by system validation rules"; the record "must be explicitly dropped (deleted) using the amendment deletion procedure and then re-filed". A console split changes all three at once, which is why the SAA is a deletion and an addition rather than a correction. Here, Build amendment refuses an update that changes a line's consolidation indicator, consolidator PAN or prior reference and tells the line to remove the line and add it back; a removed line's number is not reused in the same editing session, so the amendment carries a D on the old line number and an S on a new one. Customs has accepted the D and the S in one SAA: a Kolkata amendment of October 2026, after entry inward, removed the straight line whole and re-added the bill as a consolidation quoting the forwarder's CSN, with no house rows on the line — the CSN holds them.

How long does it take, and what does it cost?

Customs' target is 24 hours. A console split adds lines to the manifest, which Circular 14/2017's own list calls a major amendment — those are to be "generally … approved within 24 hours of the submission of the complete application", with delays escalated to the Additional or Joint Commissioner. Minor amendments are same-day.

The trade's experience is longer. At Nhava Sheva's Permanent Trade Facilitation Committee in March 2026, the shipping lines' association put approval of short-landing amendments at "10–15 days due to the requirement for hard copy documents"; customs attributed the delay to the lines' submissions and restated the 24-hour figure. Plan for the gap rather than the target.

The customs fee is ₹1,000 per manifest amendment. Ask your customs house how it applies to an SCA or SAA — the fee entry still speaks of an "import manifest or export manifest" and has never been reworded for SCMTR.

The line's own charge is the larger number. Carriers' published tariffs (2024–2026) run from roughly ₹2,000 to ₹10,000 per bill of lading, and several carriers price the work per house bill, so a ten-house split is a five-figure line item. Two carriers doubled these fees during 2026. Get the amendment right the first time; the second attempt is charged again.

Can the Bill of Entry be filed while I wait?

The importer's broker will see the house bill rejected as not available in the manifest, and there is no automatic demurrage or detention relief for the wait. The waiver framework covers goods customs has held — detained, seized, under examination or awaiting a PGA clearance. A consignment waiting on a manifest amendment is none of those, and no published instrument extends the waiver to it. If the delay is attributable to customs, a waiver certificate is something to ask your customs house for on the facts; it is not something the regulation gives you.

Is this the same as a split bill of lading?

They are unrelated, and confusing them sends you to the wrong field.

For the second one, see What does this error code mean? — 122 looks like a duplicate and is not, and the indicator has three values, of which F is the one that closes the set.

At Chennai: the help desk, and the lines told to report every failure

Chennai customs has put this problem in writing twice. Public Notice 130/2026 (23 September 2026) set up an SCMTR help desk with officers allocated by vessel — every vessel not named, and all consolidation work, goes to one pair — and says a refused SAA or SCA's Unique ID goes to them at once. A letter of 24 September 2026 from the same Commissioner to every line, copied to the consolidators' associations, records a meeting of 22 September on exactly this — adding house bills to a master — and tells the lines to work every pending consol case and send the Unique ID of any delete-and-re-file that fails, adding that delay "would be viewed adversely".

The letter describes the step as "the existing MBL is required to be deleted (CSN deletion) and re-filed after incorporating the requisite HBL details", citing Advisory 37/2026. We read that as the drop-and-re-add ICES Advisory 38/2026 Q1 publishes, in other words — the letter names neither the filing nor who deletes it, and the reasons are on the help-desk page. Officers, contacts and what to send are on Chennai customs' SCMTR help desk.

What is still unknown?

Honest gaps, because acting as though they were settled is how a filing gets refused twice:

What an accepted split SAA actually contains. ICES Advisory 38/2026 Q1 has the re-added master "configured as consolidated, linking the reference details of the CSN" — which reads as consolidation indicator C with a prior reference to the CSN, though the advisory names no codes and says nothing about the house rows' own flags. One accepted example is on record (October 2026): the re-added line declared C, quoting the forwarder's referenced-only CSN by its number and date, with the manifest's own filer as consolidator and no house rows; customs issued it an MCIN. Nothing published shows another shape.Whether the drop and the re-add go in one SAA or two. The advisory's "first drop… and subsequently re-add" reads as one amendment carrying a D and an S, and that is what an amendment built here carries; customs accepted that form once (October 2026), and two separate SAAs have not been seen.Whether a given line will file an SAA on a third party's SCA, and whether it will drop and re-add its line to do it. Not one carrier publishes a position, a form, a cut-off or a fee named for either. Ask your line before you file the SCA — that is the single most valuable question here, and the one the trade keeps recommending to each other. The deletion is the part worth confirming explicitly: it undoes a filing the line has already made and is answerable for, and the advisory publishing it does not oblige a line to do it on your timetable.What ICES does to an amendment filed after entry inward. The manifest guide lists errors 373/374 — "Entry Inward is Granted — Amendment Not Allowed" — which read as a flat refusal, while Advisory 37/2026 and the process CBIC's SCMTR team set out both describe filing the SAA and then seeking approval, which only makes sense if it is taken in and held. The latter is the better guide to intent, and nobody has published what the system actually returns. Expect either.

This page is informational. It is compiled from customs' published advisories, circulars and public notices, from a process CBIC's SCMTR team set out for the trade, from carriers' own published guidance, and from the acknowledgements customs has returned to filings. Where those sources go further than the published documents — the three windows above are the main place — they describe practice rather than a rule you can point to in a notice. It is not legal or customs advice, and practice varies by port and by line. Confirm anything that matters with your jurisdictional customs officer, your shipping line, or ICEGATE before you act on it.