Overview
- CBP’s CAPE portal, which went live Monday at 8 a.m. EDT, now accepts refund claims for unliquidated entries and those liquidated within the past 80 days.
- Phase 1 blocks entries with protests, reconciliation flags, drawback, non-ACE records, final liquidations, or AD/CVD entries awaiting Commerce instructions, and it will queue suspended or extended entries for payment after liquidation.
- Filers must upload a CSV in ACE with an “Entry Number” header and up to 9,999 11-character entry numbers, and only the importer of record or the original broker can submit, with any formatting or data errors triggering automatic rejection.
- Accepted claims move to liquidation or reliquidation and refunds post by ACH to the bank listed in the ACE Refunds tab, with statutory interest, and CBP may offset payouts against other duty underpayments or undisputed federal debts.
- Payout timing remains unsettled, with one guide citing a 45-day target after validation and another saying 60 to 90 days, and many older or complex entries will wait for later phases or must be protected through protests.