Tariff Refund Recovery Automated by AI

A tariff refund is a return of import duties paid to U.S. Customs and Border Protection when certain conditions are met — most commonly when imported goods are re-exported, used in manufacturing products that are then exported, or destroyed. The formal mechanism is called duty drawback, a U.S. government program that allows importers to reclaim up to 99% of duties paid. Claims are filed with CBP and must meet specific documentation and timing requirements.

You may qualify for a tariff refund through duty drawback if you imported goods subject to IEEPA or Section 301 tariffs and subsequently re-exported those goods, used them in manufacturing products exported from the U.S., or destroyed them under CBP supervision. Eligibility depends on your trade activity, HTS classifications, and documentation. Zollback offers an automated eligibility assessment to determine whether your specific imports and exports qualify before any commitment is made.

Processing timelines depend on the provider and complexity of the claim. Traditional drawback firms using manual workflows typically take 9–12 months to process a claim. Zollback's automated platform compresses that timeline to 10–15 working days for end-to-end processing — from document ingestion to electronic filing with CBP. Final refund disbursement timing is governed by CBP's processing schedule after claims are submitted.

A duty drawback claim typically requires import entry summaries, commercial invoices, bills of lading, export documentation, and proof of the connection between specific import and export transactions. For manufacturing drawback, production records linking imported materials to exported finished goods are also required. Zollback's AI automatically parses all of these document types from PDF, CSV, or ERP export formats, eliminating the manual data preparation burden.

Under U.S. duty drawback regulations, eligible importers can recover up to 99% of the duties paid on qualifying imports. The actual amount depends on your trade activity, drawback type, and how well import and export records are matched. Zollback's proprietary optimization algorithms evaluate every possible import-export combination to maximize the recoverable amount — recovering 15–20% more in head-to-head comparisons with legacy providers who use manual matching methods.

Zollback uses performance-based pricing with no upfront fees. You only pay when refunds are successfully recovered and deposited to your account. Zollback takes a percentage of the refund recovered, meaning incentives are fully aligned — Zollback only earns when you do. There are no retainers, setup fees, or charges for the initial eligibility assessment.