AEO stands for ‘Authorized Economic Operator’, meaning a company that is recognized for its excellent import and export safety management. Among those involved in trade, such as exporters, transporters, warehouses and customs companies, AEO is a company approved and authorized by KCS for its excellence through review in compliance with regulations, internal control systems, financial solvency, and safety management. In other words, customs authorities cerify exporters and importers who are taking measures to enhance the safety and security of goods traded between countries, through the establishment of an internal control system with good regulatory compliance.
Among the four criteria, the standards of financial solvency, safety management and internal control system are essential and must be met basically. In particular, the internal control system is evaluated separately for each applicant, and the result of the evaluation should be not less than 80 points. For companies that meet the three criteria above, AEO certificate classes are determined by measuring the legal compliance points separately. Companies with an assessment score of 80 or more points in legal compliance acquire "A“, companies with the assessment score of 90 or more points get "AA" , and companies with the assessment score of 95 obtain "AAA“.
Criteria | Definition |
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Legal Compliance | Evaluation on the compliance level under import/export related laws such as Customs Act, Foreign Trade Act, Foreign Exchange Transaction Act, etc. |
Financial Solvency | Evaluation on the financial solvency to enable the implementation of compliance with regulations (e.g. tax arrears, credit ratings, and etc.) |
Internal Control system | Evaluation on the inner-departmental communication and control system related to business activities, the flow of declaration-related documents, and accounting to maintain the adequacy of export and import declaration. |
Safety Management | Evaluation on the safety of contractors, containers, access control, human resources, handling procedures, facilities, equipments, IT, education, training, and etc. |
Criteria | basic requirements | criteria for ratings |
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A |
① satisfy financial solvency ②satisfy safety management ③score of 80 or more in internal control system |
score of 80 or more in legal compliance |
AA | score of 90 or more in legal compliance | |
AAA | among AA rated companies, the comprehensive audit shows that the company has: - a score of 95 or more in legal compliance - best practices |
* In addition to the above benefits, additional benefits such as exemption from inspection for a certain period of time are available.
Internal preparation period (3-4 months)
2 months
2 months
Ratings (A~AA)
Formal Requirements | |
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Legal Compliance | Financial Solvency |
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80 or more | - |
Actual Requirements | |
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Internal Control System | Safety Management |
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80 or more | 70 or more |
Area | Criterion | Details |
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Legal Compliance |
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Financial Solvency |
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Area | Criterion | Details |
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Internal Control System |
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Safety Management |
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Self- Assessment | Since the company has been designated as AEO company with AEO authorization, the company will go through an annual self-assessment. This self-assessment is done through submitted documents and it aims to check if the AEO company’s export and import management status is operated and managed properly in accordance with AEO criteria. |
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Comprehensive Audit | This audit is conducted against AEO companies to ascertain the fulfillment of AEO authorization criteria, and especially as for importing/exporting companies, the areas include the legality of customsclearance. |