Customs & Border Protection's Tariff Refund Efforts Deemed Satisfactory

Washington, DC, March 13, 2026-"Court of International Trade Judge Richard Eaton described CBP's [U.S. Customs and Border Protection] work to set up an automated reciprocal tariff refund process as satisfactory and continued to suspend his order to liquidate entries without International Emergency Economic Powers Act tariffs,” according to International Trade Today.

“Brandon Lord, executive director of trade programs at CBP, filed an update on the progress on March 12 at the trade court, where he said there will be a claim portal as the importers' and customs brokers' interface with the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries, or CAPE. The development of the claim portal is 70% done, Lord said.

“Once filers submit information about the entries that included IEEPA tariffs, CBP will use a mass processing program to remove IEEPA HTS numbers, and run the duty calculations for the other tariffs owed. The development for that segment of the process is 40% complete, Lord said.

“The next component of CAPE will review and liquidate or reliquidate entries. It will set the entries to liquidate or reliquidate after a number of days that Lord did not specify, enough to give CBP the chance to do a manual review if needed. This part of the program will calculate interest. These liquidations will happen Monday through Thursday, rather than the typical once a week Friday liquidations. That segment of CAPE is 80% complete, Lord said.

“The refund segment will consolidate refunds by importer of record and liquidation date, though IORs can also designate a party to receive refunds on its behalf. That part of the system is 60% complete, Lord said.