Does a new tariff apply to goods already in transit? Entry date, loading date and the in-transit clause

Which date decides the rate: order, loading, arrival or entry?

Entry. 19 CFR 141.69 says "the rates of duty applicable to merchandise shall be the rates in effect at time of entry", with three listed exceptions and one open one. The listed exceptions are warehouse entries, which pay the rate in effect when they are withdrawn for consumption; goods moved in bond on an immediate transportation entry, which take the rate in effect when that entry was accepted at the port of original importation, if they are not quota goods and are entered at the destination port without going to general order; and overcarried goods returned to the port within 90 days. The open exception is "as otherwise specifically provided for by Executive Order", which is where in-transit clauses live.

Five dates sit on every shipment, and only one of them is the default:

"Time of entry" depends on the entry type (19 CFR 141.68). For an entry summary that serves as both entry and summary, it is when the summary is filed in proper form with estimated duties. For entry documentation filed before the summary, it is when CBP authorizes release, or at the importer's request when the documentation is filed with the goods already in port, or when the goods arrive within port limits if the documentation was pre-filed. A withdrawal from warehouse enters when the withdrawal is filed and duties are deposited. Under 141.68(e), nothing is entered before the goods arrive within port limits with intent to unlade. So the rate follows the entry, not the voyage: cargo that sailed together can pay different rates if one entry is released before the effective time and another after it.

How do instruments word the effective date?

Proclamations, executive orders and USTR notices that change the Harmonized Tariff Schedule almost always say their changes apply to goods "entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on or after 12:01 a.m." eastern time on a stated date. That wording matches 19 CFR 141.69: it covers ordinary consumption entries and warehouse withdrawals, both measured at the time of entry. It says nothing about loading or shipping. A shipment loaded months earlier pays the new rate if it enters after the effective time, unless a separate clause says otherwise.

That separate clause is the in-transit or "goods on the water" clause. When it appears, it has had the same two conditions in recent actions:

1. The goods were loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading and were in transit on the final mode of transit before the effective time.
2. The goods were entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, before a later cutoff.

Both conditions must hold. Goods that meet them are reported under a dedicated Chapter 99 heading that carries no additional duty, and the broker needs the on-board date from the bill of lading to claim it. The clause is in the instrument, not in a general rule, so the only way to know whether a shipment is covered is to read the instrument for that action.

What happens when the instrument has no in-transit clause?

Proclamation 10947, signed June 3, 2025 and published at 90 FR 24199, raised the Section 232 duties on steel and aluminum articles and their derivatives "from an additional 25 percent ad valorem to an additional 50 percent ad valorem" for goods "entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on or after 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on June 4, 2025". It contains no in-transit clause. The increase took effect the day after signing.

A steel derivative loaded in Busan on May 20, 2025 and entered on June 6, 2025 paid 50 percent, not 25. The only date-based carve-out in the proclamation concerns foreign trade zones: goods admitted under privileged foreign status before June 4, 2025 pay the tariff in effect when they are entered for consumption (clause 3), and covered goods admitted to a zone on or after June 4, 2025 may be admitted only under privileged foreign status (clause 4). Under 19 CFR 146.65(a)(1), privileged foreign status fixes the rate in force when the application for that status is filed, so admitting the goods to a zone after the effective date locks in the new rate rather than postponing it.

Many Section 232 actions read this way. Proclamation 11021 of April 2, 2026, which changed how the steel, aluminum and copper duties are assessed from April 6, 2026, is worded the same: entries on or after the effective time, no in-transit relief. The pattern to expect for Section 232 is "entry date controls", but the instrument decides.

How did the IEEPA orders treat goods on the water?

Executive Order 14257 of April 2, 2025 (90 FR 15041) imposed the reciprocal duties under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Its effective-date sections exempted "goods loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading and in transit on the final mode of transit before 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on April 5, 2025", and the same for the country-specific rates from April 9, 2025. The order itself set no entry cutoff; CBP did. CSMS 64680374 (April 8, 2025) allowed the in-transit heading 9903.01.28 only for goods entered before 12:01 a.m. EDT on May 27, 2025, and CSMS 65201773 (May 30, 2025) moved the cutoff to entries before 12:01 a.m. EDT on June 16, 2025.

Executive Order 14323 of July 30, 2025 (90 FR 37739) added a 40 percent duty on products of Brazil for goods entered on or after 12:01 a.m. EDT seven days after the order, which was August 6, 2025. Its section 2(a) wrote both conditions into the order: goods that "were loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading and in transit on the final mode of transit prior to entry into the United States" before that time, and "are entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption before 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on October 5, 2025", were excepted. A Brazilian shipment loaded on August 1, 2025 and entered on September 20 qualified; the same shipment entered on October 6 did not.

CBP stopped collecting all IEEPA duties for goods entered or withdrawn on or after 12:00 a.m. eastern time on February 24, 2026 (CSMS 67834313). The in-transit question for those entries now matters for refunds: an entry that paid the duty when it qualified for the in-transit heading was overpaid even while the duty was in force. Which IEEPA entries qualify for refunds, and how, is in IEEPA refunds: which entries qualify.

How did the July 2026 Section 301 forced-labor duties treat goods on the water?

USTR's notice at 91 FR 47318 imposed additional duties of 10 or 12.5 percent on products of sixty economies, for goods entered on or after 12:01 a.m. eastern time on July 24, 2026. The DATES paragraph carries the clause: goods "loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading and in transit on the final mode of transit before 12:01 a.m. eastern time on July 24, 2026, and entered for consumption or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption before 12:01 a.m. eastern time on July 28, 2026, shall not be subject to such additional duty". Heading 9903.05.85 in the HTS carries those goods at no additional rate. The window to use it was four days.

Three containers of Indian goods (heading 9903.05.44, plus 10 percent from July 24, 2026) on two vessels show how it works. Illustrative facts.

Container B shows the second condition at work: loading before the effective time is not enough if entry misses the cutoff. CBP's guidance on these duties (CSMS 69326983, July 23, 2026) repeats the vessel wording and adds that covered goods admitted to a foreign trade zone may only be admitted in privileged foreign status from the date the duty applies. What the duty stacks with, and when it does not apply at all, is in why your entry shows the wrong duty stack.

How do you find the affected entries in your own export?

Effective dates produce errors in both directions, and they cluster in the weeks around each date. Work from the broker's entry export or ACE entry summary data:

1. List the effective dates that touch your products, with the instrument, the effective time and any in-transit cutoff. The three actions above are a start; each action has its own.
2. Filter entries by entry date to the window from a few weeks before each effective time to the in-transit cutoff, plus warehouse withdrawals (entry type 31 and its variants) in the same window, since they take the withdrawal date.
3. Add the on-board date for each entry from the ocean bill of lading. The entry export usually carries the importation date and the entry date but not the loading date.
4. Flag overpayments: entries that meet both in-transit conditions but report the rate heading (for example 9903.05.44) instead of the in-transit heading (9903.05.85).
5. Flag underpayments: entries that report the in-transit heading but were loaded after the effective time, were not on a vessel, or were entered after the cutoff.
6. Flag time-of-entry edge cases: entries within a day of the effective time, where the entry type and the time of release or filing under 19 CFR 141.68 decide the side.
7. Route each finding by entry status. Before liquidation, a post-summary correction within 300 days of entry and at least 15 days before scheduled liquidation; after liquidation, a protest within 180 days for an overpayment, or a prior disclosure for an underpayment. The clocks are in how long you have to fix a past entry.

To price a line on each side of an effective date, enter the same code and origin with two entry dates in the duty calculator. For the rest of what to check on each line, start from the post-entry audit pillar.

TariffSense reads entry summaries and broker entry exports and checks each line against the measures in force on its entry date, including in-transit headings and their cutoffs, and flags lines on the wrong side of an effective date in either direction. Whether a shipment qualifies for an in-transit clause turns on the bill of lading and the entry type; confirm with a licensed broker before any correction is filed.