In this rapidly changing trade environment, businesses should take deliberate steps to protect value, manage risk and position themselves for continuing uncertainty. Below are five actions that businesses can consider taking now.
1. Assess tariff exposure
Gaining clear visibility into a business’s current and historical tariff exposure should be a high priority. Without clarity on which duties have been paid, under what legal authorities, or for which products, businesses can miss refund opportunities, risk compliance missteps and negatively impact cash flow.
Businesses should pull and reconcile import data across systems to quantify duties paid and distinguish between those tied to invalidated authorities and those that remain legally in force. This analysis often involves examining existing classifications, codes and overlapping tariff measures. Developing and maintaining a systematic, well-documented approach now will position businesses to adapt quickly as trade policies and enforcement activities continue to shift.
2. Take actions to preserve refund rights
The Supreme Court referred the question of duty refunds for IEEPA tariffs to lower courts. On March 4, the U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT) ordered U.S. Customs and Border Protection to liquidate (meaning calculate and finalize) and, where applicable, reliquidate, or correct, certain import entries without regard to duties imposed under the IEEPA. The order does not address entries for which liquidation is already final.
The CIT order provides relief for entries affected by IEEPA tariffs, but the discussion of specific refund mechanisms is ongoing. Companies should act now to safeguard their rights, as waiting for official guidance could result in missed deadlines and lost claims.
One critical step is closely tracking liquidation timelines, which may occur sooner than expected. Once import entries liquidate, protest deadlines begin to run and companies must be prepared to act quickly. Businesses should also begin assembling supporting documentation now — import data, legal analyses and internal records — to avoid scrambling later when guidance or litigation emerges. Assembling this data may involve complex and multifaceted analyses. Coordination with external trade counsel may also be necessary to preserve claims or prepare for potential legal action.
3. Align accounting treatment with legal and policy uncertainty
Tariff changes can affect financial reporting, potentially requiring different accounting treatments, disclosures or adjustments based on timing and how they are handled relative to the balance sheet date. Close coordination between tax, trade and finance teams is critical so that accounting judgments reflect both legal realities and operational facts.
For example, the Court decision should be treated as a change in law accounted for in the period the change occurs for financial reporting purposes. If the decision occurred after the company’s balance sheet date but before issuance, it is considered a non‑recognized subsequent event. Such events do not require adjustment to the financial statements but may require disclosure to confirm that the financial statements are not misleading.
Potential tariff refunds are not yet estimable, however, and generally should not be booked prematurely. Businesses should continue accruing tariffs that remain legally enforceable, such as those under Sections 122, 232 and 301, while monitoring developments that could affect recognition, measurement or disclosure.
4. Monitor trade policy — both US and global
The current environment marks a significant transition in trade policy activity. Companies should assume ongoing change rather than a rapid return to stability and engage accordingly. In the US, temporary measures may be replaced by new investigations or actions under different trade laws, with opportunities for company input.
At the same time, US trading partners are adjusting their own policies in response to recent developments, which can affect sourcing decisions, pricing and market access. Businesses should monitor not only US initiatives and postures, but also countermeasures, negotiated bilateral and multilateral trade agreements and policy shifts abroad.
5. Revisit contracts and strengthen supply chains
Beyond the immediate tasks, businesses should use this moment to review current contracts and strengthen supply chain resilience more broadly.
“The development and the execution of a sustainable operating model and a supply chain addresses the tariff question holistically and not really from the myopic view of duty management,” says Lynlee Brown, Partner, Americas Global Trade, Ernst & Young LLP. “That larger holistic approach is really going to serve companies well in assisting in weathering the next big shake-up.”
Tariff disruption provides an opportunity to reassess how costs and risks flow through a company’s value chain. Supplier and customer contracts should be reviewed to understand who bears tariff costs, who benefits from refunds and how pricing adjustments are handled. In many cases, existing language may not contemplate refunds being paid only to importers of record, creating the potential for disputes or renegotiation.
That may include rerunning scenario analyses, reassessing sourcing and inventory locations, and revisiting longer term tools such as duty drawback, foreign trade zones, origin planning and valuation approaches. Near term tariff management should be paired with medium and long term planning to build flexibility into the operating model.
These responses will require a cross-functional and enterprise-wide approach, and coordination across tax, trade, finance, legal supply chain and government affairs teams. Tariffs should be treated not just as a customs or tax concern, but an enterprise model issue.
