On October 16, 2020, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) issued a notice announcing that exporters may request six-month validity period extensions for export licenses that are currently due to expire on or before December 31, 2020. Acting Under Secretary for Industry and Security, Cordell Hull stated, “The streamlined process will help ensure that exporters with licenses due to expire on or before the end of 2020, who may not have been able to ship orders due to resource constraints during the pandemic, have the opportunity to benefit fully from the authorizations granted on their licenses.”
The notice states that BIS has established a central electronic mailbox for submission of extension requests: LicenseExtensionRequest@bis.doc.gov. Upon receipt of the request, the original export license will be reviewed and, according to BIS, “in most cases, the validity extended via the electronic system.” BIS estimates that the majority of extension validity requests should be processed and approved within two to three business days.