“DDTC just approved my TAA, I’m going to Disney World!” Only in your dreams.
TAA approval aint no dream Billy Jean, it’s beginning of a 10-year compliance nightmare. Welcome to the TAAlight Zone.
(Ouch, that’s funny in an un-funny way.)
Actually, once your TAA or MLA is approved, you might wish you were in Disney World because now is when the work begins and now is when you company can begin to misuse the TAA or MLA and begin to rack up ITAR violations. An approved agreement means now you have to start training people about what they can do, what they can’t do, what logs, records and notations to make, what NDAs to obtain, on so on, and on, and on. And, of course, make sure everybody knows you can’t begin to use the agreement until all parties sign it.
Depending on how you do business and the scope of the TAA or MLA, one of the first steps will be to communicate to the program manager or similar person what the agreement authorizes and what must be done to comply with the terms of the agreement and the ITAR.
Once you notify the program manger, you also need to make sure you train all personnel on the scope and requirements of the TAA, and all of the work and details that entails. So they can begin to use the TAA properly.
But, your work might not be done yet. To quote former President Nixon, “Trust but verify.” You might want to remind yourself to do occasional health checks on how your company is using the TAA. Is everybody making sure all their activities are with the authorized scope of the agreement? Are people performing all of the administrative tasks such as recordkeeping, notation, logging, collecting NDAs, annual reports, and so on. Are you performing your tasks such as getting the agreement signed, filing a copy of the executed agreement with DDTC, and so on.
For export compliance people, life might be easier if DDTC denied every application. But don’t even think about sneaking in a Chinese defense manufacturer on all future TAA/MLA applications to make sure they are denied.
