CFLC system is down, CA DOJ is blaming ATF

[efillc]

My East coast supplier called DOJ and was adamantly told that without the approval number, he absolutely could not ship any firearm to California. He has refused to ship until the site is restored to functionality based upon that conversation. Luckily, I only have a few thousand tied up in this shipment. I can only imagine the chaos this is causing for large businesses.

From what I understand, if a firearm comes in w/o the CFLC approval number, it's the receiving FFL who has a problem, not the sending FFL, correct?

That said, I wouldn't want to get the receiving FFL in trouble - y'all have enough issues to deal with in CA anyway! - so I would probably hold the shipment until the system came back up.

I also work in IT as my day job, and I'm all too familiar with how a quick upgrade that should only require an outage of a few minutes can turn into a multi-day Charlie Foxtrot...

[tenpercentfirearms]

From what I understand, if a firearm comes in w/o the CFLC approval number, it's the receiving FFL who has a problem, not the sending FFL, correct?

That said, I wouldn't want to get the receiving FFL in trouble - y'all have enough issues to deal with in CA anyway! - so I would probably hold the shipment until the system came back up.

I also work in IT as my day job, and I'm all too familiar with how a quick upgrade that should only require an outage of a few minutes can turn into a multi-day Charlie Foxtrot...

Yes only the CA FFL can get in trouble. However, if the CA FFL tells you to send it anyway and simply send a number as soon as the system comes back online, take care of him and do it. Even if the guns beat the number here, I would just not sign them into my book until I get the number. I have seven days to log them in per BATFE mandates. Shipping time is at least two days if not a week. That gives me like 9-14 days to get a number.

Again, this is only if the system is down and only if you trust and probably have shipped to the dealer before.

[halifax]

Yes only the CA FFL can get in trouble...

Doesn't the ATF require FFLs to follow the laws of both states?

[jtmkinsd]

Doesn't the ATF require FFLs to follow the laws of both states?

Well, yes and no...that's why we call other FFLs before we ship and check the status of their FFL. As long as we ship to a valid dealer, there really isn't much to get in trouble for. Can't know the laws in all 50 states...hell, it's hard enough keeping up with our own.

[tenpercentfirearms]

Doesn't the ATF require FFLs to follow the laws of both states?

It is not against the law to ship firearms to a CA dealer without a CFLC. It is illegal for a CFLC authorized dealer to accept firearms without the number.

[kemasa]

You only have a week to enter the firearm into the bound book if the invoice has ALL of the required information on it, otherwise it is 24 hours.

But, the Bound Book is a Federal document with Federal requirements, so there is really no reason to not enter the firearm and many reasons to do so. If you have to ship the firearm back, you still need to log the firearm in and out, you can not ignore it. If the BATF or DOJ comes out and inspects, the firearm is still in your inventory and not logging it could cause questions. The CA DOJ has told me that if I log it into my bound book that indicates that I am going to sell it, which is wrong, but also they are making statements about what a FEDERAL Firearms Licensee should do with Federal documents and that is something that the BATF does not care for at all.

Part of the problem is that how does the FFL not accept a firearm without the number? Often, the paperwork is inside, so you don't know until you open the box and then it is too late. There is also the "requirement" that you send it back, but if the sending FFL does not include a signed copy of their FFL, is it really valid to ship it back?

[tenpercentfirearms]

Good points Ken. When will California actually say I have accepted it or I haven't?

I recently received an illegal pistol from a manufacturer. I didn't sign it in my book. I immediately contacted them and returned it. That is an interesting gray area. Do I sign an illegal gun into my book or do I pretend like I never received it? I don't like that answer either way.

[jtmkinsd]

Good points Ken. When will California actually say I have accepted it or I haven't?

I recently received an illegal pistol from a manufacturer. I didn't sign it in my book. I immediately contacted them and returned it. That is an interesting gray area. Do I sign an illegal gun into my book or do I pretend like I never received it? I don't like that answer either way.

I've gotten plenty of illegally configured firearms over the years...I log them into the boundbook (if UPS has already gone for the day). Ship them back when able. Never had a problem or been told not to do it that way.

[kemasa]

I would always log them in and then ship them back. The FFL that ships them to you is going to record that it was shipped to you and if you claim to not have a record of what you did with it, then you are going to have a problem. Most of the time when you go through the bound book, you stop at the first match, some electronic versions only show the first match and then you have to look specifically for a second match. That means that if they are tracing a firearm, it shows it was shipped to you, but you claim to not have a record of it, then what do you think will happen? If you can show that you received it and shipped it back, then they can go looking back at them for what they next did with it.

If you ship the firearm back and it gets lost, but then when the BATF comes out to talk about it and you don't show any record of it, what do you think will happen?

I admit it is a bad situation since you don't want to show that you received something that is not CA legal. When I talked to the CA DOJ about this, they said to just send it back, but there was no discussion on the bound book because that is a Federal issue. I was worried that they would claim that I should turn it over to the police or something. I suspect there could be issues with interstate commerce, which is why the best answer is to just ship it back.

BTW, I do much more logging than required because I got a call regarding a trace for a firearm that I never had, from a company I never dealt with. I log who I send my FFL to, with a serial number on each one that I send. I also encrypt the file that I send, marking to the FFL that I send it to. Also, I do other things which I can show whether or not that the FFL that someone has is a valid copy from me. Nothing happen in the mentioned trace, but it showed me that it could.