Before committing to a full review, most importers want a rough sense of what is at stake. You cannot know the exact figure without a specialist looking at your entries, but you can ballpark it. Here is a practical way to think about it.
Start with duties paid
The foundation of any estimate is how much you paid in duties over the relevant period. If you do not track this precisely, a reasonable proxy is a percentage of your annual U.S. import value, which varies by product and origin. The more you paid, the more there is to potentially recover.
Factor in your exposure
Not all duty is recoverable, so the next factor is how much of yours is tariff-affected. Importers who source heavily from China and carry significant Section 301 or IEEPA exposure have a larger recoverable share than those with little tariff-affected sourcing.
Apply a recoverable range
From there, a rough estimate applies a recoverable share to your total duties over your lookback period. This is a planning number, not a promise. The real figure depends on your specific entries, applicable exclusions, and CBP determinations.
Use the estimator
Our Refund Estimator does this math for you from a couple of inputs, giving a ballpark range in seconds. It is illustrative, not a quote. When you want a real figure, a free eligibility check and specialist review turn the ballpark into an answer.