Today, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) opened its Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) system to allow for the filing of refunds for tariffs that the U.S. Supreme Court recently declared unlawful. To file, importers and customs brokers must log in to CBP’s online Automated Commercial Environment and file so-called “CAPE Declarations” for CBP to review. If a declaration is accepted, the CBP system will go into the shipment’s records, remove the line of tariffs tied to the International Economic Emergency Powers Act (IEEPA)and recalculate the duties. Refunds will be issued in a lump sum per importer including interest, rather than per shipment. Customs is rolling out the CAPE system in phases with this first phase limited to certain imports that aren’t yet considered final or have been finalized within the past 80 days. Customs is evaluating when the next phase will begin.
CBP’s Trade Transformation Office (TTO) will conduct two identical webinars for the trade community at 1 PM on Tuesday, April 21, 2026 (register here) and at 1 PM on Tuesday April 28, 2026 (register here). Registrants will receive the access link for the webinar the day of the event, but entry into the webinar is on a first-come, first-served basis as seats are limited. After the live event, this and other previously recorded webinars will be available for replay on the CVP website here. CBP has also released several documents explaining the new refund filing process, including: (1) a one page overview entitled ACH Refund Enrollment; (2) frequently asked questions called ACE Portal and ACH Refunds FAQs; and (3) a Training Video entitled Electronic Refund Enrollment in the ACE Portal. More resources are available on CBP’s IEEPA Duty Refunds page here.