Tariff refund portal opens for second phase of reimbursement submissions
U.S. Customs and Border Protection opened its tariff refund portal to a second phase of applications Monday, allowing importers to seek reimbursements for additional duties they paid to bring goods into the U.S. before the Supreme Court struck down the import taxes earlier this year.
In its staged approach, the federal government initially allowed companies to seek refunds for active entries as well as ones that were up to 80 days past the date of their liquidation — meaning the final calculation and assessment of duties.
Some of the imports now eligible for tariff refunds are ones that were “flagged for reconciliation” — or for which the final duty calculation was not fully settled at the time of entry. In these cases, the importer filed preliminary customs declarations with the best available data, and final duties were expected to be settled at a later date.
The Liberty Justice Center, which represented businesses that sued over the tariffs, recommended that importers review their entries carefully before submitting a refund application, as not all reconciliation entries are covered in Phase 2.
Phase 1 for tariff refunds began in April.
A third phase including entries that were liquidated more than 80 days before the refund period — meaning they are the furthest along in the procedural timeline for finalizing tariff payments — is tentatively slated to start later this summer.
However, the Justice Department is appealing an order issued by U.S. Court of International Trade Judge Richard K. Eaton in March that “all importers of record’’ were "entitled to benefit" from the Supreme Court’s ruling in February that the president did not have the authority to use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, to impose sweeping tariffs on most goods being brought into the U.S.
“Regarding importers with finally liquidated entries who have chosen not to file a lawsuit thus far, the government has consistently explained that CBP requires an order from the Court to reliquidate finally liquidated entries,” Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate wrote in a filing Friday.
The plaintiffs in the case have said that individual companies should not have to each file legal challenges to get their money back and are asking the judge to certify a class, which would allow them to sue on behalf of a much larger group of importers.
Customs officials estimated earlier this month that entries under the Phase 3 guidelines would account for about 6.9% of the total $166 billion in IEEPA tariffs collected.
At the same court proceeding, Susan Thomas, executive assistant commissioner at CBP’s Office of Trade, estimated that more than $100 billion in refunds would be processed and approved by the end of June after being entered into what is called the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries, or CAPE, portal.
A separate 10% global tariff that Trump levied through the Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 has also faced legal challenges. But a federal appeals court said earlier this month that the Trump administration could continue collecting the duties as the cases worked their way through the courts.
