Streamline Your Duty Drawback Claims Process with The Information Lab

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Case Study

Here's how we accelerated the Duty Drawback process for our client in the Automotive industry. The same team of 4 people achieved a 24X improvement in drawback claims productivity after engaging with Information Lab Ireland.

From $2.5M duty drawback claimed

Team: 4 people Time taken: 2 years

To $7.8M duty drawback claimed

Team: 4 people Time taken: 3 months

with Drawback Advantage™ from The Information Lab

Did you know that an estimated 85% of eligible U.S. duty drawback refunds go unclaimed and are ultimately lost?

What is Duty Drawback?

Drawback is the refund of certain duties, internal revenue taxes and certain fees collected upon the importation of goods and refunded when the merchandise is exported or destroyed. Claims can be made up to 5 years from the importation date, but due to the complexity in collecting all the evidentiary documentation required for a successful claim, it is estimated that 85% of eligible claims are never submitted. For large manufacturers this amounts to tens and sometimes hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Opportunity

Tangible cash is returned to the organisation's bank account when claims are successful

The Challenge

  • Duty drawback process is time-consuming and ineffective for many organisations.

  • Reliance on data from multiple systems complicates the process.

  • Significant manual processing is required, including collation and matching of export and import data.

  • High volume of manual tasks contributes to inefficiency.

  • Dedicated teams are often assigned to manage the process.

  • Despite dedicated efforts, companies struggle to keep up with the backlog.

  • As a result, only a fraction of eligible duty drawback claims are successfully processed.

What We Deliver

  • Our service automates and streamlines duty drawback processes.

  • We provide a matching engine that efficiently handles backlogs of unclaimed transactions.

  • This solution allows your organisation to claim back up to 5 years of missed duty drawback opportunities.

  • It also ensures you stay on top of your annual duty drawback workload going forward.

Benefits of Our Solution

  • Drawback Advantage™ is a state-of-the-art solution for streamlining and automating the Duty Drawback process.

  • It helps companies efficiently recover duties, taxes, and fees.

  • Leverages technology to mitigate the financial impact of Section 301 tariffs.

  • Improves cash flow through streamlined and automated processes.

  • Creates rich data assets for strategic analysis.

  • Ensures companies remain competitive and financially resilient in today's challenging trade environment.

What you gain

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Maximised Returns

100% of your eligible transactions are analysed and processed into duty drawback claims, leaving no eligible claims on the table.

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Centralised Data

Giving you increased control, improved compliance and better decision making.

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Accelerated Growth

Once your data is centralised, you can transition to leveraging predictive analytics and forecasting, enabling you to identify trends, anticipate future outcomes, and make data-driven decisions.

Learn how your organisation can process Duty Drawback claims faster. Cover Image

Learn how your organisation can process Duty Drawback claims faster.

With our data-driven, automated and streamlined approach.

Why us

At The Information Lab Ireland, we are experts in data, analytics tools and process automation. This is what we live and breathe. This is why our customers keep coming back to us to help them fast-track their data journey to drive growth for their businesses.

We roll up our sleeves and get the job done. We clean the data with you raising the data capabilities of your team. We are not afraid of doing the dirty work because we know what to do with messy. By taking care of the data, we free up your time to solve more strategic business problems.

The Duty Drawback Lifecycle

Our service helps you automate and streamline your duty drawback processes.

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Our dedicated duty drawback team

Kevin Lynch Image

Kevin Lynch

Head of Consulting

Petra Stracar Image

Petra Stracar

Finance Transformation Lead

Nikita Parab Image

Nikita Parab

Senior Consultant

Contact our Duty Drawback specialists to accelerate your journey

FAQS

What are the Types of Duty Drawback?

There are three major types of Customs Border Patrol- CBP duty drawback returns.

Unused Merchandise Drawback provides for drawback upon the exportation or destruction under CBP supervision of imported merchandise upon which was paid any duty, tax, or fee, if the merchandise has not been used within the United States before such exportation or destruction.

Manufacturing Drawback provides for drawback upon the exportation or destruction under CBP supervision of commodities manufactured or produced in the United States with the use of imported merchandise, provided that those articles have not been used in the United States prior to such exportation or destruction.

Rejected Merchandise Drawback provides for drawback upon the exportation or destruction under CBP supervision of imported merchandise which has been entered, or withdrawn from warehouse, for consumption, duty-paid, and which:

  • Does not conform to sample or specifications;

  • Has been shipped without the consent of the consignee; or

  • Has been determined to be defective as of the time of importation; or

  • Ultimately sold at retail by the importer or the person who received the merchandise from the importer, and for any reason returned to and accepted by the importer or the person who received the merchandise from the importer.

How are exported or destroyed merchandise matched to their relevant imported components?

There are 2 methods by which imports and exports can be matched for drawback claims: Direct identification and Substitution. However, the substitution method does not apply for exports to USMCA countries.

Direct Identification matching uses lot/batch or serial number tracing to match an exported product with its exact importation. In the absence of lot or serial number tracing, an acceptable inventory accounting method (such as FIFO) can be utilised.

The Substitution method allows claimants to match “similar” merchandise within very broad time frames. The definition of “similar” products are products that fall within the same 8 digit Harmonized Tariff Schedule Number. The ability to use the substitution method applies to both manufacturing as well as unused, but the rules vary for each.

How long does it take to implement your solution and file a claim?

This depends greatly on the availability and quality of the matching data as well as the mechanics of the filing process. Where we have worked with clients that already had a claims filing mechanism in place such as a broker relationship, we were able to implement Drawback Advantage, start processing the backlog and prepare claims for filing in 8-12 weeks.

Once you engage with our Duty Drawback team, we can perform an initial Discovery and agree on timelines.


Can we automate the duty drawback process?

Parts of the process remain manual such as identifying and preparing the data and filing the claims, but with Drawback Advantage, we have developed an automated matching engine that automates the largest and most time consuming step in the Duty Drawback lifecycle.

What are the practical steps involved in The Information Lab Ireland’s service?

We start with a Discovery phase where we capture the key Business and Functional requirements, the Business Process Flow and produce the Statement of Work.

Once we get the green light, Solution Development commences, followed by Handover & Transition, that includes Knowledge Transfer on the use of the fully implemented solution.

You, the client, then commences with clearing the backlog with our support.

How can The Information Lab Ireland help me with my duty drawback claim process?

With Drawback Advantage, we remove the key blocker that stands in the way of most organisations achieving their Duty Drawback goals. Matching Exports to their respective Imports and batching them for manageable sized claims is the most time-consuming step in the Duty Drawback lifecycle.

How can I find out more about your solution to accelerate my duty drawback claims process?

Download the whitepaper