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The compliance checklist for small and medium importers: 2026

Updated October 19, 2026. Facts current as of that date.

Updated October 19, 2026: what has changed since this checklist was first dated
– CAPE Phase 3 opened October 6 for finally liquidated entries of court plaintiffs (CBP declaration, ECF No. 58).
– Since October 10, changing ACH refund details in the ACE Portal requires a security token (CSMS # 70162211).
– The Canadian import bans (Proclamations 11061 to 11063) and the second phase of the pharmaceutical tariffs took effect September 29. Section 338 coverage changed September 15 (Proclamations 11064 and 11065).
– CBP proposed new low-value shipment rules on October 8; comments are due December 7, 2026. Entry Type 13 for mail becomes mandatory January 20, 2027.
– The CIT certified a class of IEEPA importers on October 8. A polysilicon program starts December 4, 2026.

Many small and medium importers have relied on a customs broker or a freight forwarder to handle the customs side of the business, and for years that worked. The events of 2025 and 2026 changed that. Refunds of IEEPA duties go to the importer of record through a government portal. Bond requirements have risen with duty levels. And the duty on a product now depends on several overlapping tariff actions, each tied to its classification and origin.

The checklist below is organized around the main obligations. For each one, it states what the rule or CBP guidance says, links to the source, and gives the question to ask. It describes requirements; it is not a substitute for advice from a licensed customs broker or a trade attorney.

1. Identity and access

Importer identity on file with CBP. Under 19 CFR 24.5, each person or business must file CBP Form 5106, the Create/Update Importer Identity Form, with its first formal entry or its first request for services that will result in a bill or a refund. The identification number is normally the business’s IRS employer identification number.
Question to ask: Is the business name, address and identification number on our Form 5106 record current?

Power of attorney. Under 19 CFR 141.46, a customs broker must obtain a valid power of attorney before transacting customs business in an importer’s name. The broker keeps it; it is not filed with CBP.
Question to ask: Which brokers hold a power of attorney for us, and are any of them firms we no longer use?

ACE Portal access. CBP’s Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) is the system where entries, liquidation status and refunds are recorded. CBP’s guidance on the IEEPA refund process, known as CAPE, makes three points. A broker can file CAPE declarations only for entries it filed, using its own ACE account. Adding refund bank details requires the importer’s own ACE Portal account with an “Importer” sub-account. And refunds can be directed to a party the importer designates on CBP Form 4811.
Question to ask: Do we have a working ACE Portal login with the Importer sub-account, and who in the business holds it?

Business Insider reported in May 2026 that Megan Sweeney, CEO of California ball-bearing company Pacific International Bearing, spent several weeks trying to access ACE so she could claim a refund, because no one at the company had logged on in years. “We never had the need to be active on the ACE portal,” she said.

Electronic refunds. Under CBP’s electronic refunds interim final rule, effective February 6, 2026, CBP issues refunds by ACH, with limited exceptions. CBP said in a court declaration that as of October 2, 20,362 IEEPA refunds worth about $1.1 billion were held because ACH details had not been provided. Since October 10, adding or changing ACH details requires a security token sent by email, with text message as an option.
Question to ask: Are ACH refund details for the importer of record, or its Form 4811 designee, registered in the ACE Portal?

2. The customs bond

Formal entries require a bond. Under CBP’s February 2024 public guide to bond amounts, the minimum continuous bond for basic importation is $50,000 or 10 percent of the total estimated duties, taxes and fees in the previous 12 months, whichever is greater. Unpaid bills can raise the requirement. CBP’s October 8 proposed rule on low-value shipments would also require a basic importation and entry bond for all Entry Type 11 and Entry Type 13 filers.

When duties rise, the required bond rises with them. CNBC reported in February 2026, citing CBP data, that CBP identified 27,479 bond insufficiencies worth almost $3.6 billion in fiscal 2025, a record.
Question to ask: Was our bond amount set before the 2025 tariff increases, and has our surety or broker reviewed it against the last 12 months of duties?

3. Classification and tariff stacking

The base duty rate comes from the product’s ten-digit HTS classification. Additional tariffs are applied through Chapter 99 headings. These now include:
– Section 232 tariffs on metals, vehicles, wood products, semiconductors, pharmaceuticals and drones, with polysilicon to follow on December 4, 2026.
– Section 301 tariffs on China, on Brazil, and since July 24, 2026 on the 60 economies in USTR’s forced-labor investigations. Goods subject to Section 232 tariffs are exempt from the 60-economy tariffs.
– A Section 201 tariff-rate quota on quartz surface products since August 15, 2026 (Proclamation 11051).
– Section 338 duties on certain Canadian goods since August 22, 2026.

The schedule is changing quickly. The US International Trade Commission’s release list shows that Revision 21 of the 2026 HTS took effect on October 9, 2026. The full 2024 schedule had 10 revisions. Since April 6, 2026, Section 232 metals tariffs apply to the full customs value of covered products, “regardless of metal content” (Proclamation 11021).
Question to ask: For our top products, do we know the current HTS code, every Chapter 99 line on recent entries, and which annex of which action applies?

CBP issues binding classification and origin rulings under 19 CFR Part 177, and past rulings are searchable in its CROSS database.

4. Country of origin and valuation

Origin now drives the rate on most goods, not just goods from China. The 60-economy Section 301 tariffs are 10 or 12.5 percent, and for some economies the normal duty plus the Section 301 duty totals that rate. A 25 percent Section 301 tariff has applied to imports of Brazil since July 22, 2026, with exemptions.

Marking is a separate requirement. Under 19 U.S.C. § 1304, every article of foreign origin, or its container where permitted, must be marked “in a conspicuous place as legibly, indelibly, and permanently as the nature of the article (or container) will permit,” showing the English name of the country of origin to the ultimate purchaser.

Value matters as much as origin. Customs value is generally the transaction value under 19 U.S.C. § 1401a. Preference claims under trade agreements, such as USMCA under 19 CFR Part 182, need supporting documentation.
Question to ask: Do our suppliers’ documents support the origin, value and any preference we declare, and do the goods carry matching marking?

5. Low-value shipments

Since August 29, 2025, the duty-free de minimis exemption in 19 U.S.C. § 1321(a)(2)(C) has been suspended for all shipments “regardless of value, country of origin, mode of transportation, or method of entry” (Executive Order 14324). Low-value shipments now require entry and pay applicable duties. The suspension was continued after the Supreme Court’s IEEPA ruling (Executive Order 14388). Separately, Section 70531 of Public Law 119-21 repeals the statutory exemption for commercial shipments from July 1, 2027.
Question to ask: For samples, spare parts and small orders, who files the entry, who is the importer of record, and who pays the duty?

6. Reasonable care, corrections and forced labor

Reasonable care. Under 19 U.S.C. § 1484, the importer of record must use reasonable care in making entry. That duty stays with the importer when a broker files.

Fixing errors. Errors on an entry can be corrected before liquidation by a post-summary correction and after liquidation by protest. Where a violation of 19 U.S.C. § 1592 may have occurred, a prior disclosure under 19 CFR 162.74, made before or without knowledge of a formal investigation, can reduce penalties. Time limits and strategy depend on the facts and are for a broker or attorney. CBP’s refund guidance notes that once an entry is on a CAPE declaration, corrections and protests cannot be filed until it liquidates.

Forced labor. Under 19 U.S.C. § 1307, goods made wholly or in part with forced labor are barred from entry. Under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, CBP applies a rebuttable presumption that goods made in China’s Xinjiang region, or by an entity on the UFLPA Entity List, are prohibited.
Question to ask: Do we have a written process for checking entries, correcting errors and documenting our supply chain?

7. Records

Under 19 CFR 163.4, records required by CBP generally must be kept for 5 years from the date of entry. Shorter periods apply to some records: drawback records until the third anniversary of payment of the claim, packing lists for 60 days after the release period, and certain informal-entry and duty-free low-value records for 2 years. 19 U.S.C. § 1508 lets CBP set retention periods of up to 5 years.

Records matter for refunds as much as for audits. Business Insider reported that refund claims have been rejected over errors on the underlying entries, and quoted Emil Stefanutti of Gaia Dynamics: “I recently saw a Louis Vuitton bag being classified as a turbo propeller.”
Question to ask: Can we pull entry summaries, invoices and payment records for every entry in the past 5 years without asking the broker?

8. Liquidation and protest deadlines

Liquidation. Liquidation is CBP’s final computation of duties on an entry. Under 19 U.S.C. § 1504, an entry not liquidated within 1 year of the date of entry is deemed liquidated, unless extended or suspended.

Protest. Under 19 U.S.C. § 1514(c)(3), a protest must be filed within 180 days after the date of liquidation or reliquidation.

IEEPA refunds. CAPE opened in phases. Phase 1 (April 20, 2026) covers certain unliquidated entries and entries liquidated within the preceding 80 days. Phase 2 (June 29) covers certain entries flagged for reconciliation. Phase 3 (October 6) covers finally liquidated entries of court plaintiffs. Other finally liquidated entries depend on court action, including the class action certified on October 8.
Question to ask: Who is tracking liquidation dates on our entries in ACE, and what is the 180-day protest date on each one?

The experience behind this list

NPR reported in May 2026 on Richard Brown, who runs Proof Culture, a sneaker accessory company, from Ohio. According to NPR, the business “rarely handled customs forms. But to get a tariff refund, that had to change.” “I don’t want to be a customs broker when I grow up,” Brown told NPR. Business Insider’s reporting on Pacific International Bearing describes the same problem with ACE access, and CNBC reported that bond shortfalls strained relationships between importers and their brokers. These are individual businesses, not the whole importing community, but they show arrangements that worked when a broker handled everything now needing the importer’s own records and attention.

Sources

Requirements and deadlines on this list change often. Subscribe free to the Importer Weekly briefing for a weekly summary of what changed, with links to the official text.

For decisions about your own entries, refunds or filings, talk to your licensed customs broker or trade attorney.

General information, not legal or customs advice.

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