Katherine Li, West Coast breaking news reporter at the Business Insider.

Paid IEEPA tariffs on overseas purchases? Here is what shipping companies are saying about refunds

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If you made an overseas purchase last year that required shipping, the federal government may owe you money.

After Trump ended the de minimis exemption last year, purchasing an item straight from an international vendor, regardless of the item’s value, meant incurring International Emergency Economic Powers Act tariffs.

Now, thanks to a ruling by the Supreme Court that overturned Trump’s IEEPA tariffs, and a ruling by the Court of International Trade ruled that all tariffs paid under IEEPA must be returned, buyers may be able to collect a refund.

The Customs and Border Protection said in a declaration on March 6 that it could start rolling out refunds as soon as April, after some technological updates to its system. The CIT estimates that the CBP owes $165 billion in duties that must be refunded with interest, with about $650 million accruing each month.

Even though Trump introduced a new 10% “global tariff” under Section 122, meaning that overseas purchases will continue to face an extra charge, some shipping companies told Business Insider they are willing to help consumers claw back what they paid under the IEEPA.

From FedEx to USPS, here is what different companies are saying about refunding tariffs paid by individual consumers.

Some companies are willing to help

FedEx was the first company to file a lawsuit with the CIT to secure “a full refund” after the Supreme Court decision.

A spokesperson for FedEx told Business Insider that the lawsuit was “on behalf of our customers” and that the company is committed to returning tariff costs.

“Our intent is straightforward: if refunds are issued to FedEx, we will issue refunds to the shippers and consumers who originally bore those charges,” the spokesperson said.

“When that will happen, and the exact process for requesting and issuing refunds will depend in part on future guidance from the government and the court,” the spokesperson added.

Similar to FedEx, UPS told Business Insider that the company will support customers in obtaining IEEPA tariff refunds after a process is established by relevant agencies.

“We remain focused on keeping shipments moving and helping ensure our customers can fully exercise their rights throughout this complex process,” said a UPS spokesperson.

Morgan & Morgan also filed a proposed class action lawsuit in March against FedEx to recover the costs of import duties and fees associated with IEEPA in a legally binding manner.

“While FedEx has stated publicly that they plan to return those funds to their customers, the company did not make any legally binding statements to that effect in their complaint,” said Morgan & Morgan in a statement to Business Insider, “Nor have they mentioned any plan to refund the significant ancillary fees they charged for processing those tariffs.”

Other major companies

USPS is one of the most popular and affordable methods of shipping small goods, but it can be complicated as a government-owned entity.

USPS has been collecting tariffs for items via its prepaid “Delivered Duty Paid” service, mostly to avoid surprise fees and a buildup of abandoned small items at the border. Unlike FedEx or UPS, it is an independent agency that belongs to the executive branch of the federal government.

Though USPS pays for its own operations and is not funded by taxpayers, it is legally complicated for federal agencies to sue each other in court because they are part of the same legal entity, so it is unknown if USPS could obtain refunds for shippers or receivers through legal means. According to the Department of Justice website, a government agency can sue another only if it can prove a concrete adversity of interest.

A USPS spokesperson told Business Insider that the CBP is responsible for questions regarding the “disposition of tariff monies.”

The CBP and shipping company DHL did not respond to requests for comment.




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Major US trade groups pressing Trump to give tariff refunds ‘en masse’

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US trade groups are pressing President Donald Trump and his administration to quickly pay tariff refunds to small businesses.

In a joint press release, the Consumer Technology Association and the US Chamber of Commerce said they had filed a brief on Wednesday in V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. Trump, a lawsuit by small businesses seeking refunds from Trump’s sweeping tariffs.

“The brief argues that an efficient, orderly process to deliver refunds is in the best interest of all parties — the Administration, the courts, and American businesses,” the press release wrote.

“On behalf of the hundreds of thousands of businesses, especially small businesses, that are now owed refunds, the Chamber and CTA are asking the court to establish an efficient, orderly process to deliver refunds en masse,” Neil Bradley, the Chamber’s executive vice president,  said in the release.

He added that the trade organizations were concerned that other parties might try to benefit from the refund process, and “the last thing our system needs is for the trial bar to be profiting off refunds owed to small businesses.”

“While this matters for every American company, refunds are existential for the many smaller businesses and startups who shouldered the tariff burden,” Ed Brzytwa, CTA’s vice president of international affairs, said in the release.

The trade groups’ filing comes after the Supreme Court ruled, in a 6-3 decision in February, that Trump’s tariffs were illegal and that his justification for invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act was invalid.

And on Wednesday, Judge Richard K. Eaton of the US Court of International Trade ruled that US businesses that were subjected to tariffs are “entitled to the benefit” of the Supreme Court ruling.

Even before Eaton’s ruling, companies had started demanding refunds. Major companies like Costco, Toyota, BYD, and FedEx filed lawsuits against the administration, seeking billions of dollars in tariff duties since they were imposed last April.

Representatives for the Trump administration did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.




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Judge clears path for refunds on Trump tariffs ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court

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  • A Supreme Court ruling recently struck down President Donald Trump’s IEEPA tariffs.
  • A federal judge on Wednesday said companies are entitled to benefit from that ruling.
  • US Customs must recalculate duties on imports, disregarding Trump’s IEEPA tariffs, per court order.

A federal trade judge on Wednesday cleared the path for refunds on President Donald Trump’s tariffs, applied through the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, after the Supreme Court recently struck them down.

In the ruling, Judge Richard K. Eaton of the US Court of International Trade said that US importers who were subject to those tariffs are “entitled to the benefit” of the Supreme Court ruling.

Eaton also ordered the US Customs and Border Protection — the agency responsible for collecting import duties — to “liquidate” import entries without regard to the tariffs Trump imposed through the IEEPA, a national emergency law that gives a president broad authority to regulate economic transactions.

The judge is essentially ordering the government agency to calculate the final bill for certain shipments entering the US as if the IEEPA tariffs never applied. Any accounting on goods that have already been calculated, or “liquidated,” but are not legally final, needs to be redone without the duties, the judge ordered.

Importers generally have 180 days after goods are liquidated before the accounting is legally finalized.

The move is another blow to the Trump administration, which sought to raise government revenue through taxes on imports. Trump applied double-digit tariffs through an executive order on nearly every country in April 2025, calling it “Liberation Day.”

On February 20, the Supreme Court struck down, in a 6-3 ruling, Trump’s IEEPA duties, stating that the national emergency law does not give the president the ability to unilaterally impose tariffs. The ruling made no explicit mention of refunds.

In the Wednesday order, Eaton indicated he will serve as the sole judge overseeing cases involving refunds of IEEPA duties.

The exact dollar figure for refunds remains unclear. The Penn Wharton Budget Model estimates that the tariff reversals could generate up to $175 billion in refunds.

Spokespeople for the White House and CBP did not immediately return a request for comment.




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Democrats demand Trump issue $1,700 tariff refunds to Americans after Supreme Court ruling

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President Donald Trump previously promised Americans tariff dividend checks, but if Democrats have their way, he could be issuing refunds instead.

After a Supreme Court ruling on Friday struck down Trump’s tariffs levied under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, Democratic lawmakers were quick to demand that the president repay Americans through tariff refunds.

“Donald Trump should return that money immediately. He has an obligation,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom said on Friday. “$1,751 per family that were taxed by Donald Trump. He took hundreds of billions of dollars from working folks, from the ag community, from small businesses for this vanity play, this illegal action, and he finally was held to account. The rule of law won out.”

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker sent a letter to Trump calling for refunds to families in his state.

“Your tariff taxes wreaked havoc on farmers, enrage our allies, and sent grocery store prices through the roof,” Pritzker said in the letter. “On behalf of the people of Illinois, I demand a refund of $1,700 for every family in Illinois.”

The governor also sent an invoice billing that amount for more than 5.1 million Illinois families, totaling more than $8.6 billion. The invoice said it was “PAST DUE – DELINQUENT.”

When reached for comment, White House spokesman Kush Desai responded in part by saying if Pritzker “really cared about delivering economic relief for Illinois, he’d start with his own state government instead of chasing another stupid headline.”

The offices of Newsom and Pritzker did not respond to requests for comment.

Both Newsom and Pritzker are considered potential candidates for the presidential election in 2028, and they’ve both been highly critical of Trump.

The governors appeared to be basing their requests for refunds of that amount on a report released this month by Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee in Congress. The report found American families paid an average of $1,745 in tariff costs between February 2025 and January 2026, for a total of over $231 billion paid by consumers.

Other studies, including from Harvard Business School and The Budget Lab at Yale, have found that tariff costs are largely paid by American businesses and consumers.

The Supreme Court on Friday ruled that tariffs issued under the IEEPA, a national security act, had exceeded the president’s authority. Trump denounced the decision and said he would pursue additional tariffs through other avenues.

In November, Trump touted the money being collected from tariffs and floated the idea of sending $2,000 tariff dividend checks to middle and low-income Americans, though issuing such checks would likely have required an act of Congress. In January, Trump gave mixed messages about his plans for tariff rebate checks.

Now, with the IEEPA tariffs struck down, it’s likely some American businesses will try to receive refunds for the tariff costs they paid.

Despite Democrats’ stance on the issue, there’s a lot of uncertainty about whether or how refunds would happen.

The Supreme Court ruling did not touch on issuing tariff refunds.

When Trump was asked Friday if the government would now have to issue refunds, he said, “I guess it has to get litigated for the next two years.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Friday it was “unlikely” Americans would receive tariff refunds.

“I got a feeling the American people won’t see it,” Bessent said, adding, “My sense is that could be dragged out for weeks, months, years.”




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The battle over Trump tariff refunds is next — and it will be messy

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The Supreme Court on Friday overturned the centerpiece of President Donald Trump’s tariff plans, ruling the federal government illegally collected over $133 billion in taxes from American businesses.

Now comes the battle over refunds for tariffs paid, which Trump on Friday predicted could take years.

“I guess it has to get litigated for the next two years,” he said at a White House press conference, while blasting the ruling as “terrible” and “defective.”

One reason: Over 1,000 companies have filed lawsuits to claw back money from the government if the Supreme Court overturned Trump’s tariffs justified by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Brett Kavanaugh also predicted the process could become a “mess,” citing refund requests tallying “billions of dollars to importers,” even as some importers have already passed those costs to consumers.

Here are all your questions about tariff refunds, answered by experts.

Alright, who do I ask to get a refund?

Typically, the refund process would be handled by Customs and Border Protection, which collected the tariffs in the first place.

In order for that to happen, the Trump administration would need to establish a process for handling refund requests. The White House, which didn’t return Business Insider’s request for comment, has yet to signal plans to do this, said Rachel Brewster, a professor of international trade at Duke Law School.

Without a formal process in place, claims will be litigated in the Court of International Trade, which will order CPB to issue refunds to specific companies, Brewster said.

OK, so how will the court handle the process?

In the past, the Court of International Trade has ordered refunds when it has found particular taxes to be invalid — albeit on a smaller scale, according to Daniel Mach, a commercial litigator at Bryan Cave.

It’ll likely turn to the process that followed a 1998 Supreme Court decision to overturn a harbor maintenance tax, which also resulted in refunds, Mach said.

“It’s been a while,” Mach said. “Everyone’s going to be kind of figuring out the ropes as they go. But at the end of the day, it’s not an unsolvable problem.”

Given the number of claims, the Court of International Trade is likely to appoint an administrator or special master to consider each of them, rather than handling the lawsuits piecemeal, Mach said.

Groups that advocated for the Supreme Court to overturn the IEEPA tariffs have urged the Court of International Trade to develop a smooth process for refunds.

“The refunds will serve as an economic boost and allow companies to reinvest in their operations, their employees and their customers,” said David French, an executive at the National Retail Federation, in a statement.

OK, that sounds messy. How long will it take to get a refund?

The whole refund process — whether through CPB or through a class-action or administrative processes in court — could take up to two years, according to Brewster.

Have a lot of companies asked for refunds?

Yes! The cases that went to the Supreme Court were groups of small companies, including a wine importer and an educational toy retailer. But several massive corporations, including Toyota and Costco, have also filed refund lawsuits.

What about me? My Shein order was more expensive than expected.

You can try to get a refund for personal orders hit by tariffs, but it’ll be complicated.

In asking CPB or a court for a refund, you’ll have to distinguish tariffs you paid pursuant to IEEPA, which were overturned, and the tariffs justified by other laws, which remain on the books.

Individual lawsuits for IEEPA tariffs on individual retailer orders, like from Temu and Shein, likely won’t be worthwhile. The legal fees would likely exceed any potential refund. But it’s possible that some enterprising litigators would put together a class-action lawsuit to make it worthwhile, Brewster predicted.

“It was an illegally imposed tax,” she said. “So in theory, everyone is entitled to a refund.”

With reporting by Brent Griffins




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