BEA Survey Questions

• Which BE-12 Form to File? PDF

Reporting on BEA’s direct investment surveys is mandatory under the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (P.L. 94–472, 90 Stat. 2059, 22 U.S.C. 3101–3108, as amended). The act protects the confidentiality of the data that companies report.

The act specifies that the survey data may only be used for statistical and analytical purposes. BEA is prohibited from granting another agency access to the data for tax, investigative, or regulatory purposes. In addition, data reported on BEA’s surveys are not subject to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis uses previous survey filings with BEA and other sources, such as external databases and news media reports, to identify entities that may be subject to the reporting requirements of the survey. BEA then alerts entities regarding the mandatory filing requirement. While companies meeting the survey requirements are required to complete the survey whether or not they are contacted by BEA, the notification letter helps companies to comply with the law.

Please note that each U.S. affiliate must retain a copy of its report for at least 3 years after the report’s original due date.

If prior filings were submitted through the BEA eFile System at www.bea.gov/efile, these reports may be accessed through this system.

File your BE-12 survey report online with eFile at www.bea.gov/efile. This is the best method of submission providing a confirmation of submission and access to your previously submitted eFile data.

You may also file by attaching your submission to a secure message in eFile, sending by fax to 301-278-9500, or mailing to the address on the form. We do not recommend submitting your survey report via email as this is not a secure transmission method for your company’s confidential information.

Note: More detailed instructions are available in “How to use eFile” in PDF format at www.bea.gov/efile/efile_link_instructions.pdf.

To link a BE-12 survey:

To retrieve your username: Go to www.bea.gov/efile and select Forgot your username? next to the username login. You will be asked for the email address associated with the user account. If the email address matches an account in the BEA eFile System, the username will be sent to that email address.

Each survey ID can only be linked to one user account. If more than one person uses the same eFile account, they must share the username and password linked to the survey ID.

Only one contact person can have login credentials for a U.S. affiliate at a time. If you still have access to the previous user’s email, you can retrieve the existing login information by going to www.bea.gov/efile, selecting Forgot your username? to have the username sent via email, and then selecting Forgot password? to reset the password.