If your summer is going anything like ours, you’re probably heading out for at least a short road trip.  

So when you say, “Pass the guidebook,” beware that in our car, it’s the sightseeing guide from Barnes & Nobel in one hand and the ATF download in the other.  That’s right.  Our summer reading is the 104-page “ATF Guidebook – Importation & Verification of Firearms, Ammunition and Implements of War.”

No, we’re not suffering from heat stroke.  We’re simply sharing our recommended summer reading.  The ATF Guidebook – no fooling – is the perfect book for the summer.  

Even if you do not handle importation or implements of war, the ATF Guidebook is the perfect primer for the structure of all things ATF for any FFL.  And, one of the great benefits of reading just outside your business area is that it triggers your brain to either say, “Oh, the equivalent is…” or “Hmm, I wonder if there is an equivalent…”

So what’s in it?

Each chapter is a discrete subject, including general information, firearms verification, terminology and nomenclature, and machinegun destruction.  It leads off with a chapter on policies and procedures, but, instead of being a straight recitation of the law and the regulations, it is a discussion and it simultaneously explains the associated forms.  The on-line version of the Guidebook also contains hyperlinks into the ATF website and to additional documents, like, for example, “The Department of Treasury Study on the Suitability of Modified Semiautomatic Assault Rifles.”

What this ATF Guidebook also does for you is reconfigure the same information several different ways.  It lists the law.  It summarizes and discusses the law.  It lists the associated applications and forms, along with hyperlinks.  It puts the information into charts.  And, it even includes diagrams.

One section you might find of particular interest the titled “Surplus Military.”  Whether you are an importer, dealer, or collector, this section speaks to those “[f]irearms which are of special interest to collectors by reason of some quality other than is associated with firearms intended for sporting use or as offensive or defensive weapons.”  This way, when a firearm catches your eye while you’re out on your travels, you’ll know right where to go to make sense out of following sentence, “Pursuant to the provisions of 18 U.S.C. §925(e), a Type 08 or 11 FFL may import SMCR firearms into the United States pursuant to an approved ATF Form 6 import permit.”

The following materials referenced in this blog are available on the Orchid Advisors on-line research library by clicking this hyperlink:  “ATF Guidebook – Importation & Verification of Firearms, Ammunition, and Implements of War