Terms of service

01 · What you agree to

Using this site, submitting a power of attorney through it, running the duty estimator, or engaging us to file means you accept these terms and our privacy policy. If you accept on behalf of a company, you are confirming that you have authority to bind it, and from that point “you” means the company. If we have a signed service agreement or rate agreement with you, that document controls wherever it says something different from this page.

02 · What we are

DAPE Solutions Incorporated is a New Jersey corporation licensed as a customs broker by US Customs and Border Protection. We transact customs business: entry and entry summary filing, tariff classification and valuation, Importer Security Filing, partner government agency data, customs bond placement, in-bond movements, post-summary corrections, protests and drawback.

We are not a carrier, a warehouse, or a freight forwarder on your shipment unless we have separately agreed to act as one, and we are not a law firm. Where the work needs a lawyer, we will say so.

03 · Power of attorney

We cannot file anything for you until a valid power of attorney is on file, and CBP can ask to see it at any time. The rules governing customs powers of attorney are in 19 CFR Part 141. Three things follow from that:

• The person signing must have authority to bind the importer, and we verify identity and authority before acting on the grant.
• A power of attorney stays effective until revoked in writing. A revocation takes effect when we receive it, and applies going forward. It does not unwind entries already transmitted.
• A grant from a non-resident importer carries extra formalities, and we will tell you what is required before you sign.

Granting a power of attorney does not oblige us to accept every shipment. We may decline work, and we say when and why in section 14.

04 · NCBFAA terms

Brokerage services are provided subject to the NCBFAA Terms and Conditions of Service, which are the standard terms in this trade and are incorporated into our engagement by reference. Among other things they set out the scope of our duty as your agent, the time limits for presenting a claim against us, the limitation on our liability, and our general lien on documents, records and merchandise in our possession for unpaid charges.

We will send you the current version on request. Where those terms and this page address the same subject in a brokerage transaction, the NCBFAA terms control; this page controls for the website and the online tools.

05 · Your information

Under 19 U.S.C. 1484, the importer of record, not the broker, must use reasonable care in declaring classification, value, quantity and origin. We build the filing from what you and your suppliers give us. We ask questions, and we push back when a document does not look right, but we cannot audit a mill certificate or a price we never saw. You agree to tell us, without waiting to be asked:

• Any relationship between you and the seller, and any price adjustment, rebate or transfer pricing arrangement between you.
• Assists, royalties, licence fees, tooling and proceeds of resale that belong in dutiable value.
• The melt-and-pour country for steel and the smelt and cast origin for aluminium. Section 232 duties on derivative articles follow the metal content, not the country the finished article shipped from, and only your supplier holds that information.
• Whether the goods fall within the scope of an antidumping or countervailing duty order, or whether a scope ruling has been requested on merchandise like yours. If the answer is unclear, say so before the goods ship, not after they land.
• Any prior CBP action on the same merchandise: a request for information, a notice of action, a detention, a seizure, a penalty, or a prior disclosure.

If information you supply is wrong and duties, penalties, interest or liquidated damages follow, they are yours.

06 · Advice, not rulings

Classification and valuation opinions we give you are our professional judgement. They do not bind CBP. Only CBP issues binding rulings, through the process in 19 CFR Part 177, and we will prepare a ruling request when the exposure justifies it. Nothing on this site or in our correspondence is legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship.

07 · The duty estimator

It estimates. Rates move with executive action, Federal Register notices and amendments to the tariff itself, sometimes overnight and sometimes with retroactive effect. Section 232 inclusions, Section 301 list coverage, IEEPA actions and antidumping cash deposit rates change faster than any calculator can track. Use the output to budget, not to price a contract, and ask us before you rely on it. We are not liable for a commercial decision made on the strength of an estimate.

08 · Fees and payment

Our fees are what we quoted you, or what our current rate schedule says. Duties, taxes, merchandise processing fee, harbor maintenance fee, excise and every other government charge are yours and are separate from our fee. Where we advance government or third-party charges for you, we are extending credit rather than absorbing cost, and you reimburse us promptly.

Invoices are due on their stated terms. Past-due balances may carry a service charge at the highest rate the law allows, and we may stop filing for an account that is materially in arrears. We hold a general lien on documents, records and goods in our possession until charges are paid.

One point CBP requires every broker to make: if you are the importer of record, you may pay duties, taxes and fees directly to CBP rather than through us, and paying us does not discharge your liability to CBP if those funds are not remitted. Tell us if you want to pay CBP directly and we will set it up.

09 · Bonds

If we arrange a customs bond, the contract runs between you and the surety. We act as agent in placing it. Keeping enough bond capacity for your duty exposure is your responsibility. In the current tariff environment a continuous bond sized on last year’s duties is very often insufficient, and an insufficient bond causes rejected entries and stacked liability. We will flag it when we see it coming. The decision to increase is yours. Claims, terminations and saturation are matters between you and the surety.

10 · Confidentiality and records

Your commercial information is confidential. That is a regulatory obligation under 19 CFR 111.24, not just a promise. We keep customs records for five years from the date of entry as 19 U.S.C. 1508 and 19 CFR Part 163 require, which means ending the engagement does not delete the file. You remain independently responsible for your own recordkeeping. The broker copy is not a substitute for the importer’s records, and CBP will ask you for yours.

11 · Disclaimer

The site, the duty estimator and all content are provided as is and as available, without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including any implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy or non-infringement.

Brokerage services are performed with professional care, but we do not guarantee that an entry will be released, that cargo will not be examined, detained or seized, that duty will be assessed at any estimated rate, or that any particular outcome will be reached with CBP or a partner government agency.

12 · Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, including demurrage, per diem, detention, storage, lost profit, lost sales or lost goodwill, even if we were told the risk existed.

Our aggregate liability on any claim is limited as provided in the NCBFAA Terms and Conditions of Service, and where those terms do not apply, to the fees we charged for the transaction giving rise to the claim. We are not liable for duties, taxes, penalties, interest or liquidated damages assessed against you, nor for the acts or omissions of CBP, a partner government agency, a carrier, a terminal or a surety.

A claim must be presented to us in writing within the period the NCBFAA terms allow, and suit brought within the period they allow. A claim presented late is waived. If you think something has gone wrong on a file, tell us early. Most of what can be fixed is fixed through a post-summary correction or a protest, and both have deadlines of their own.

13 · Indemnity

You will indemnify and hold us harmless against claims, losses, penalties, fines and costs, including reasonable legal fees, arising from information you gave us that proved to be inaccurate or incomplete, from your importation of the merchandise, from your breach of these terms or of any law, or from the acts of your employees and agents. If we are named in a CBP penalty action because of a declaration made on your instruction, this section is the one that applies.

14 · Ending the relationship

Either side can end it. You revoke the power of attorney in writing; we will confirm receipt, complete or hand off the entries already in motion, and invoice for work done. We may decline or stop work if invoices go unpaid, if identity or signing authority cannot be verified, if we are instructed to file something we believe to be incorrect, or if continuing would put our broker licence at risk.

We will not transmit an entry we believe to be false. That is not a negotiating position, and it does not change under commercial pressure. Sections 10 through 13 and 15 survive the end of the relationship.

15 · Governing law and venue

New Jersey law governs these terms, together with the federal customs law that governs the work itself. Any dispute between us that a court has to decide belongs in the state or federal courts sitting in New Jersey, and both sides consent to jurisdiction there.

Note what that clause does not reach. A dispute with CBP over classification, appraised value, exclusion from a duty, or liquidation is not ours to settle privately. It runs through the CBP protest process and, on appeal, the United States Court of International Trade. No agreement between you and us changes that route.

16 · General terms

Events outside our control. We are not liable for delay or failure caused by port closures, government shutdowns, ACE or agency system outages, cyber incidents, strikes, weather, war, embargo, or a change in law or tariff policy. Our obligations are suspended for as long as the event lasts.

Assignment. You may not assign these terms without our written consent. We may assign them to a successor that holds a valid customs broker licence.

Severability and waiver. If a provision is unenforceable it is narrowed to the extent needed, or severed, and the rest stands. Not enforcing a right once does not waive it.

Changes. We may update these terms. The revised version is posted here with a new date, and continued use of the services after that is acceptance. If a change is material, we will say so rather than rely on you to notice a date.

Entire agreement. These terms, the privacy policy, the NCBFAA Terms and Conditions of Service, the power of attorney and any signed service agreement are the whole of the agreement between us, and replace earlier discussions on the same subjects.

17 · Contact

DAPE Solutions Incorporated
Attn: Legal
1600 Lower Road, Unit 6, Linden, NJ 07036
info@dapecustoms.com