BEA will soon be mailing delinquency letters to businesses and others that have not submitted their responses to the 2017 BE-120 survey, the Benchmark Survey of Transactions in Selected Services and Intellectual Property with Foreign Persons.
Responses were due by the end of July 2018. A response is required from entities subject to the reporting requirements of the BE-120, whether they are contacted by BEA or not. BEA mailed notifications to relevant entities known to BEA in April 2018.
To prevent further follow-up action or penalty, a completed Form BE-120 must be submitted no later than Sept. 28 (unless an extension was obtained prior to Aug. 1).
Reporting on the BE-120 is mandatory under the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act. A BE-120 response is required of U.S. individuals, companies, and other entities that had foreign sales or purchases in the services and intellectual property types covered by the survey during their 2017 fiscal year. A response is required regardless of the transaction amount. There are civil and criminal penalties for failure to file.
The reported information is kept confidential by law and can only be used for statistical purposes.
The BE-120 survey is necessary to obtain up-to-date data on the size and economic significance of services transactions and intellectual property transactions between U.S. and foreign persons. The aggregated statistics produced by BEA are publicly available on our website. They are used in the production of key economic statistics, including the U.S. trade balance, the U.S. international transactions accounts, and U.S. gross domestic product. They help users analyze the impact of international trade on the U.S. economy and on foreign economies, inform trade promotion efforts, and provide U.S. businesses information about market opportunities.
To ensure that your report is received as soon as possible, please consider using one of these filing methods: electronic filing, available at www.bea.gov/efile; fax to (301) 278-9507; or overnight delivery.
For assistance, contact BEA staff at be-120help@bea.gov or (301) 278-9303, or send us a message through BEA’s Secure Messaging System by logging into eFile at www.bea.gov/efile. Forms, reporting requirements, and FAQs are available at www.bea.gov/ssb. Forms can also be obtained via autoreply by sending a blank email to be-120@bea.gov.