On February 6, 2026, an Interim Final Rule published by CBP took effect requiring that all refunds to importers be issued electronically via ACH. No more paper cheques, absent a very narrow waiver. For importers sitting on IEEPA refund claims, this changes a practical piece of the process without changing the legal right to file a protest. Understanding the distinction — and the sequence in which ACH enrollment and protest filing interact — is the difference between filing a claim you can collect and filing a claim that sits uncollected.
This post walks through the rule, explains what ACH enrollment actually is, clarifies why it is a refund-delivery requirement rather than a protest-filing requirement, and addresses the waiver path — which is narrower than a lot of coverage suggests.
The rule, in one paragraph
On January 2, 2026, CBP published an Interim Final Rule (docket USCBP-2025-1076) mandating that all CBP refunds be disbursed electronically, except in narrow circumstances that qualify for a waiver. The rule implements Executive Order 14247 (“Modernizing Payments To and From America’s Bank Account,” March 25, 2025) and took effect on February 6, 2026. The statutory authority is 31 U.S.C. § 3332, Treasury’s general direct-deposit requirement, and the implementing regulations at 31 C.F.R. Part 208.
The rule applies to all CBP refunds — not just IEEPA refunds, not just Form 19 protest refunds. Drawback, Section 301 exclusions, reconciliation adjustments, and every other refund channel CBP administers is now ACH-only as a practical matter.
What ACH enrollment actually is
“ACH enrollment” is a slightly fancy way of saying: telling CBP where to send your refund money, in a format its payment system can use. The ACH (Automated Clearing House) rail is the US domestic electronic payment network. To receive a credit over it, the payee provides a bank account number and a routing number.
For an importer, the enrollment is done through the ACE portal using the banking information page CBP provides. The importer identifies themselves by their IOR number, provides their bank details, and CBP records those details against the importer’s profile. Once enrolled, every refund CBP issues on that importer’s behalf flows through the ACH channel.
CBP maintains an ACH Refund page with the enrollment instructions. An importer who already operates in the US and has an ACE account can complete the enrollment in an afternoon. An importer without an ACE account — and particularly a foreign importer without a US bank account — has more work ahead of them.
The critical distinction: filing vs receiving
Here is the distinction that determines whether the ACH rule blocks you or simply affects your downstream timing.
Filing a protest and receiving a refund are governed by different bodies of law. The protest channel — the statutory right to contest a CBP decision and the regulatory process for doing so — lives in Title 19 of the US Code and at 19 C.F.R. Part 174. The ACH mandate lives in Title 31, at 31 U.S.C. § 3332 and 31 C.F.R. Part 208. The two are maintained by different agencies (CBP for customs, Treasury for payments) and address different questions (can you file vs how you get paid).
The regulation that lists the required contents of a valid protest — 19 C.F.R. § 174.13(a) — is an exhaustive list, and it does not include ACH enrollment, bank account numbers, or refund delivery details. The optional refund-designation language in § 174.13(c) is explicit that the refund block is optional: the subsection is titled “Optional designation for refunds” and uses the words “if desired” and “may.”
The IFR itself confirms the two sides sit in different lanes. In its own text, the rule provides that if CBP certifies a refund but cannot complete the payment because the importer has not provided valid banking information, no interest accrues on that refund until the information is provided. In other words: the protest is processed, the refund is approved, and the only consequence of missing ACH enrollment is that the money waits in a suspense state until the importer sets it up.
What that means for sequencing:
- You can file a protest before you have ACH set up. The protest is legally valid.
- You cannot be paid before you have ACH set up. That piece has to happen before CBP disburses.
- The right approach is to file protests on urgent entries immediately, and pursue ACH enrollment on a parallel track so that by the time CBP approves the refund, the enrollment is complete.
The waiver path, honestly described
The IFR preserves a waiver mechanism under 31 C.F.R. § 208.4. A lot of coverage treats this as an escape hatch for foreign importers without US bank accounts. That reading overstates what the regulation says.
The waiver criteria that could plausibly apply to an importer are narrow:
- (a)(1)(v) — for individuals in remote locations without access to electronic transaction infrastructure. This is an individual-level exception, not a corporate one, and requires a notarised certification to Treasury. Not applicable to a business.
- (a)(2) — for countries where the political, financial, or communications infrastructure does not support payment by electronic funds transfer. This is intended to cover countries where the banking system genuinely cannot receive a US ACH credit — not countries where the importer simply does not have a US bank account. China, the EU, Japan, Korea, Australia, the UK, and essentially every major trading partner of the United States have full EFT capability, and the waiver does not apply to importers in those jurisdictions.
- (a)(3) — for payments in a foreign currency that Treasury cannot support electronically. Not applicable, because CBP refunds are always issued in US dollars.
- (a)(7) — where the agency does not expect multiple payments to a recipient within a year, and the recipient is an individual or small business. This is an agency-level determination, not an importer-requested one, and it is not a practical mechanism for an importer to rely on.
CBP and Treasury have stated publicly that they expect waivers to be rare. The burden of demonstrating eligibility rests with the importer. Our honest read is that the waiver path is not a viable workaround for the typical foreign importer, and a strategy built around obtaining a waiver is more likely to produce a denied waiver than an approved one.
What foreign importers actually need to do
For an importer based outside the United States, the ACH requirement is the hardest part of the refund process. The realistic paths are:
- Use an existing US bank account — if the business has a US subsidiary, a US branch, or any related entity with US banking, that account can be used for the ACH enrollment
- Open a US business bank account — some major US banks will onboard a foreign-owned business without an in-person visit; others require it. The process takes weeks and involves KYC and tax documentation
- Use a third-party receiver — a licensed customs broker or trade attorney who can receive the refund on the importer’s behalf and forward it onward. Relationship-specific and subject to the third party’s own compliance terms
None of these is fast. All of them can run in parallel with protest filing, so the protest deadline does not have to wait for them. The order of operations is: file protests first so the 180-day clock stops on your entries, then solve the ACH question on a separate track. See the foreign importer guide for the broader picture.
The one-line summary
ACH enrollment is for receiving the refund, not for filing the protest. You can file first, set up ACH later, and still get paid. A claim that sits in suspense because ACH is not set up is a solvable problem; a claim that never existed because the 180-day deadline was missed is not.
Tariff Spot generates and mails your Form 19 protest now and surfaces ACH enrollment guidance inline so you know what to set up next. Start a refund claim.