Get to Know CBP’s ACE Portal
The Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) is a digital platform offered by U.S. Customs & Border Protection (CBP) to members of the trade community. It is CBP’s centralized system for all trade processing and documentation. This free service is an extremely beneficial but often underutilized tool for all importers.
In this blog, we’ll highlight some of the key features of the ACE portal and the upcoming enhancement schedule from CBP.
ACE is intended to serve as a centralized system for importers & exporters, CBP, and Partner Government Agencies (PGAs) to communicate with each other. ACE allows companies to file importer security filings, import truck filings, file protests, and submit electronic export information, among a host of other features. This ultimately provides a more efficient way to submit documentation and lead to quicker decisions from CBP. When necessary, ACE can also interact directly with PGAs to support interagency processing and communication, further streamlining the process.
Once a company has applied for and created an account, it can establish multiple sub-accounts to manage different aspects of its business. For example, sub-accounts may be used to handle importer, carrier, broker, or exporter activities. There are 13 different types of sub-accounts available to accommodate various business functions.
ACE also offers targeted customizable reports to assist with compliance efforts. Users can tailor reports to their needs, ranging from general transaction data to financial or manifest reports, as well as monitoring the status of protests filed with CBP.
CBP continues to introduce enhancements to ACE to make the platform more efficient and beneficial for users across the industry. Notably, any refunds issued by CBP will be required to be issued electronically beginning in February 2026. The beginning of this process was announced in mid-2025 to allow users adequate time to enroll in ACH payments.
One of the most anticipated enhancements is scheduled for release in March 2026. With this update, ACE will be able to calculate and estimate import duties on entries that have multiple HTSUS codes. While CBP released an update in mid-2025 increasing the number of HTSUS codes allowed per line, ACE has not yet been able to calculate the estimated duties on those entries. This functionality was originally anticipated for January 2026 but has since been delayed.
The full release schedule can be found here and includes updates to modernize manifests for various modes of transportation, expanded payment options, and additional system enhancements.
If you have questions about the ACE Portal or need assistance creating an account, please contact Scarbrough today.
