AES Broadcast 09/29/2009                     Broadcast # 2009045

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AESDirect Program Outage

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This message is intended for AESDirect program users only. If you are 
not an AESDirect program filer, you will not be affected by this outage.

Due to utility maintenance at the primary datacenter for the AESDirect 
program, AESDirect will not be available for 4 to 6 hours beginning at
10:30 AM EDT Sunday, October 4, 2009. We will send another e-mail 
broadcast message on Sunday, October 4, 2009 as soon as the AESDirect 
is back on-line.

We strongly encourage you to file your shipments prior to this outage 
when possible.

During this outage all AESDirect program filers may submit shipments 
under the AES Downtime Policy. State Department licensable shipments 
can not be exported under the AES Downtime Policy and must be held 
until the connection is restored and an Internal Transaction Number (ITN) 
is received.  Once the connection is restored, all AESDirect program 
transactions for shipments that were exported under the 
AES Downtime Policy must be filed along with any new AES transactions.

AESPcLink users are encouraged to continue creating and storing 
shipments in a queue on their local computer for transmission when 
AESDirect is brought back on-line.

If you utilize the AES Downtime Policy for  export, please contact 
the port where you will export from. In lieu of the 
AES Proof of Filing Citation, please use the AES Downtime Citation 
which consist of the phrase AESDOWN, your individual company's Filer ID, 
followed by the date.

For example: AESDOWN 123456789 10/04/2009

Please see the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) web site for 
further information on the AES Downtime Policy:
    
http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/trade/automated/aes/tech_docs/aestir/june04_intro/

For further information or questions, contact the U.S. Census Bureau's 

AES Branch at 1-800-549-0595, menu option 1 or at at [email protected].