The U.S. Trade Representative has announced the procedures to request exclusions from 301 duties for goods found on List 3. An exclusion request form must be completed and submitted through a portal (http://exclusions.USTR.gov) which will open on June 30, 2019. The deadline to submit the requests is September 30, 2019. Each request must specifically identify a particular product and provide supporting data and the rationale for the requested exclusion. Responses to individual exclusion requests are due 14 days after the request is posted on the USTR portal. Any replies to responses to an exclusion request are due the later of 7 days after the close of the 14 day response period, or 7 days after the posting of a response. The USTR will evaluate each request on a case by case basis. Granted exclusions will be effective retroactively to September 24, 2018 and extend for one year after the publication of the exclusion determination in the Federal Register.
We encourage importers to act quickly to submit their exclusion requests for List 3. List 3 has over 5700 items, far more than Lists 1 and 2. List 1 has about 800 items. 214 exclusions have been granted to date with 2116 exclusion requests still undergoing review. List 2 has about 280 items. No exclusions have been granted yet. 1259 exclusion requests have been denied and 1661 requests are undergoing review. We anticipate there will be many thousands of requests for List 3 which will take the USTR quite some time to review given the status of exclusion requests for Lists 1 and 2.
Please contact Vandegrift for any questions regarding the Chinese 301 tariffs and obtaining refunds for goods on these exclusion lists.