Incoterms® 2020 groups its 11 rules into two families: seven that work for any mode of transport, EXW, FCA, CPT, CIP, DAP, DPU, and DDP, and four restricted to sea and inland waterway transport only, FAS, FOB, CFR, and CIF. Every rule answers the same three questions differently: who arranges and pays for carriage, who insures the goods, and at what point risk of loss or damage passes from seller to buyer.

This Incoterms chart lays out all 11 rules side by side, explains the E, F, C, and D groupings that determine how cost and risk are split, and points to dedicated guides on the four rules that account for most of the volume search and the most common disputes: DAP, CPT, DDP, and the sea-only FAS and FOB pair.

All 11 Incoterms® 2020 Rules in One Table

The International Chamber of Commerce publishes Incoterms® 2020 as the current, authoritative version of the rules, effective since January 1, 2020. The table below lists all 11, grouped by mode, with who arranges carriage, who is obligated to insure, and where risk transfers to the buyer.

Two columns matter more than the others for a shipper trying to avoid a dispute: ‘who arranges carriage’ tells you who is contractually paying the freight bill, and ‘risk transfers to buyer’ tells you who eats a loss in transit. As the CPT and CFR rows show, those two columns do not always point to the same party or the same location, and assuming they do is the single most common misreading of this chart.

Rules for Any Mode of Transport

Seven rules work for any mode, or a combination of modes: truck, rail, air, ocean, or multimodal. EXW, Ex Works, is the seller’s minimum obligation: the seller makes the goods available at its own premises, not loaded, not cleared for export, and the buyer bears essentially all cost and risk from that point forward, including the export declaration, which is often impractical for a buyer to complete since it is not the exporter of record.

FCA, Free Carrier, has the seller deliver by handing the goods to a carrier the buyer nominates, at a named place that can be the seller’s own premises or elsewhere. Risk transfers at that handover. Incoterms® 2020 added a specific mechanism to FCA allowing the buyer to instruct its carrier to issue the seller a bill of lading with an on-board notation, which solves a long-standing problem for sellers shipping under a letter of credit that requires proof the goods are loaded.

DAP and DPU are the two ‘delivered’ rules that stop short of import clearance: the seller carries cost and risk to the named place, and the buyer clears the goods for import. DPU is the only Incoterms® 2020 rule requiring the seller to unload the goods at destination; DAP does not. CPT and CIP split cost and risk differently, with the seller paying carriage to the named destination while risk passes to the buyer much earlier, at the first carrier. CIP adds a seller insurance obligation at the all-risk Institute Cargo Clauses (A) level; CPT carries none.

DDP, Delivered Duty Paid, is the seller’s maximum obligation: the seller delivers the goods cleared for import, duty paid, ready for unloading at the named place. The DAP vs DDP comparison covers why that shift makes the seller the importer of record, or requires it to arrange one, which is rarely simple for a seller with no legal presence in the destination country.

None of the seven any-mode rules require unloading by the seller except DPU, and none require export or import clearance from the buyer except EXW on the export side and DDP on the import side. Every other combination leaves export clearance with the seller and import clearance with the buyer, which is worth memorizing on its own since it holds true across CPT, CIP, DAP, FCA, FAS, FOB, CFR, and CIF without exception.

Rules for Sea and Inland Waterway Transport Only

Four rules are written specifically for cargo that moves by sea or inland waterway and are not valid for air, rail, or road-only shipments. FAS and FOB transfer risk before the main ocean carriage even begins, alongside the vessel for FAS and once loaded on board for FOB, with the buyer arranging and paying for the ocean freight itself.

CFR and CIF mirror CPT and CIP but for sea freight specifically: the seller pays freight to the named port of destination, yet risk still transfers when the goods are on board the vessel at the port of shipment, the same point as FOB. CIF layers on a seller insurance obligation at the Institute Cargo Clauses (C) minimum-cover level, the lowest tier available and notably less protective than CIP’s all-risk requirement.

The ICC’s own guidance in the Incoterms® 2020 introduction is direct about when these four rules stop making sense: for containerized cargo, which typically changes hands at an inland container terminal rather than crossing a ship’s rail, FCA, CPT, or CIP are the better fit. FAS, FOB, CFR, and CIF remain correct for cargo that genuinely loads directly onto a vessel, bulk commodities, break-bulk, and similar trades.

How to Read Cost and Risk Across the E, F, C, and D Families

The 11 rules sort into four letter families, and once the family is understood, the cost and risk allocation for any individual rule becomes predictable. EXW is the sole ‘E’ rule: minimum seller obligation, everything falls to the buyer. The ‘F’ rules, FCA, FAS, and FOB, have the buyer arrange and pay for main carriage, with the seller simply delivering to the buyer’s carrier or vessel; risk transfers at that same delivery point.

The ‘C’ rules, CPT, CIP, CFR, and CIF, are where cost and risk genuinely diverge: the seller pays for carriage to a named destination but risk transfers to the buyer much earlier, at origin. This is the family most often misread, because ‘seller pays freight to X’ sounds like ‘seller is responsible until X,’ and under a ‘C’ rule it is not. The ‘D’ rules, DAP, DPU, and DDP, are the mirror image: the seller carries both cost and risk all the way to the named place, with DDP adding import clearance and duty on top.

Choosing the Right Rule for a Given Shipment

Mode of transport is the first filter: if the shipment is not moving exclusively by sea or inland waterway, FAS, FOB, CFR, and CIF are not available, full stop, regardless of what a template contract says. The second filter is who has the local knowledge and standing to clear customs at each end. Export clearance sits with the seller under every rule except EXW; import clearance sits with the buyer under every rule except DDP.

Beyond that, the decision is largely commercial: how much of the transit risk each party is willing to carry, and how much insurance cost either side wants baked into the price. A trade advisory review before the contract is signed, not after the shipment is en route, is the point where an incorrectly chosen Incoterm is cheapest to fix, and it is a service a licensed customs brokerage can provide alongside the entry filing itself.

Common Incoterms Mistakes That Cost Shippers Money

The most frequent error is using a sea-only rule, usually FOB, for cargo that is not actually loaded directly onto a vessel by the seller, which creates a risk-transfer point that does not match how the cargo physically moves. The second is treating Incoterms as if they answer questions they were never designed to answer: an Incoterm allocates cost and risk between buyer and seller, it does not determine the customs value duty is assessed on, and it does not determine the tariff classification of the goods, which is governed separately by the General Rules of Interpretation applied to the Harmonized Tariff Schedule.

The third is leaving the named place vague, a city instead of an address, which turns a routine risk-transfer question into a dispute the moment cargo is damaged. And the fourth, the one with the highest financial exposure, is a foreign seller agreeing to DDP into the United States without first confirming it can actually act as, or arrange, an importer of record, a question answered in full where DAP and DDP are compared directly, before the contract is signed rather than after the shipment is stuck at the port.

Frequently Asked Questions

CPT, Carriage Paid To, is the Incoterms® 2020 rule where the seller pays freight all the way to a named destination, but risk of loss or damage transfers to the buyer the moment the goods are handed to the first carrier at origin. The cost point and the risk point are not the same place, and that split is exactly what trips up buyers who assume CPT works like DAP, where cost and risk both run to the destination together.

This guide walks through where CPT delivery and risk transfer actually occur, works a concrete example so the split is unambiguous, and compares CPT to its insured sibling CIP and to the sea-only rules that share the same cost logic. CPT applies to any mode of transport, not sea freight alone, which is itself a common point of confusion.

What CPT Incoterms Mean and Where They Apply

CPT Incoterms require the seller to contract and pay for carriage of the goods to a named place of destination. That is the extent of the seller’s cost obligation. CPT is one of the seven Incoterms® 2020 rules for any mode of transport, so it works equally for a truckload move, an air shipment, or a full multimodal ocean-to-inland routing, unlike FAS and FOB, which are restricted to sea and inland waterway transport only.

CPT sits in the ‘C’ family of Incoterms rules alongside CIP, CFR, and CIF. The defining feature of every ‘C’ rule is the same: the seller pays for carriage to a named destination, but the seller’s risk ends much earlier, at origin, not at that destination. That is a deliberate design choice in the rules, not an inconsistency, and it exists because the seller cannot control what happens to the cargo once it leaves its custody, even though it is still paying the freight bill.

The named place of destination has to be stated precisely, and for good reason: it fixes exactly how far the seller’s cost obligation runs, even though it has no bearing on where risk transfers. A contract that just says ‘CPT USA’ or ‘CPT Midwest’ leaves the freight cost boundary open to argument the moment accessorial charges, demurrage, or a last-mile drayage bill show up on an invoice neither party expected to pay. Naming a specific facility, port, or rail ramp closes that gap before it becomes a dispute.

Why CPT Risk Transfers at Origin, Not at the Destination

Under CPT the seller delivers, and risk passes to the buyer, when the goods are handed over to the carrier contracted by the seller, or to the first carrier if more than one carrier is used for the carriage. A carrier here is any party that undertakes carriage: a trucking company, an airline, an ocean carrier, a railway, or a freight forwarder acting as carrier.

That means the buyer carries the risk of loss or damage for the entire main transport leg, even though the seller is the one paying for it. If the goods are damaged mid-ocean or mid-flight, the loss is the buyer’s problem contractually, and the buyer’s cargo insurance, not the seller’s, is what should respond, because CPT carries no insurance obligation for either party.

This is the point that catches people off guard. A buyer who reads ‘seller pays carriage to Chicago’ and assumes the seller is also on the hook if the cargo is lost somewhere over the Pacific has misread the rule. Cost and risk are two separate questions under every ‘C’ rule, and CPT answers them differently.

A Worked Example: CPT Named Place of Destination

Take a shipment sold CPT Chicago, with the seller located in Vietnam. The seller books and pays an ocean carrier to move the container from the origin port to a rail ramp in Chicago, plus the inland rail leg to get it there. The seller’s cost obligation runs all the way to that named place, Chicago.

Risk, however, transferred back at the origin port the moment the container was handed to the first carrier, the ocean line. If the container is damaged during the trans-Pacific voyage, the buyer bears that loss even though the seller is still contractually paying for the voyage and the inland rail move that follows. If the seller had instead sold the same shipment DAP Chicago, the seller would have carried both the cost and the risk for that same voyage, because DAP is a ‘D’ rule, not a ‘C’ rule.

That comparison is the cleanest way to see what CPT actually buys the buyer: a lower risk-adjusted price than DAP in most negotiations, since the seller is not pricing in transit risk it does not carry, but a real obligation for the buyer to insure the goods for the ocean leg if it wants that risk covered.

The freight the seller pays under ‘carriage’ typically includes the main transport leg and the origin and destination charges bundled into the carrier’s own tariff, terminal handling, documentation fees the carrier itself charges, and any transshipment cost. It does not automatically include destination charges billed separately by a third party, such as a bonded cartage fee or a customs exam fee, unless the contract of carriage the seller booked happens to cover them. Buyers who assume ‘carriage paid’ means every destination charge is covered are frequently surprised by a drayage or exam invoice that CPT never obligated the seller to pay.

CPT vs FOB and CFR: Same Split, Different Mode

CPT’s cost-risk split is not unique to CPT. FOB and CFR, the sea-only rules, use the same underlying logic, risk transfers early, at or before loading on the vessel, regardless of who is paying for the ocean freight afterward. CFR is functionally CPT’s sea-only cousin: the seller pays freight to the named port of destination, but risk transfers when the goods are on board the vessel at the port of shipment, not when they arrive.

The practical reason to choose CPT over CFR, or over FOB, comes down to mode and cargo type. Containerized cargo that moves through an inland terminal before ever reaching a vessel does not have a clean ‘on board’ moment the way break-bulk or bulk cargo does, which is why CPT, along with FCA and CIP, is generally the better fit for containerized and multimodal freight, while the sea-only rules remain suited to cargo that genuinely loads directly onto a vessel at a port.

CPT vs CIP: When You Need Insurance Too

CIP, Carriage and Insurance Paid To, is CPT with one addition: the seller must also procure cargo insurance for the buyer’s benefit. Under Incoterms® 2020 the minimum insurance requirement for CIP was raised to Institute Cargo Clauses (A), all-risk cover, up from the lower Clause C minimum cover that applied under the 2010 rules. CPT itself carries no insurance obligation at all.

The choice between the two comes down to who is better positioned to buy the coverage. A buyer with an existing open cargo policy often prefers CPT and insures the shipment itself. A buyer without one, or a seller that wants to guarantee a baseline of protection changes hands with the goods, will negotiate CIP instead, understanding that the seller’s insurance cost gets built into the price either way.

Who Handles Export Clearance and Import Duty Under CPT

The seller handles export clearance under CPT: export licenses, export declarations, and any export duties or fees. The buyer handles import clearance at the named destination: import customs entry, duty, taxes, and, where applicable, an import license for the specific commodity. That split does not change based on where risk transfers; it runs on its own track.

It is worth being explicit that CPT never makes the seller the importer of record. Even though the seller is paying to move the goods all the way to the named place, and even though that place might sit deep inside the buyer’s own country, the seller has no import compliance obligation under CPT beyond providing the documents and information the buyer’s broker needs to file the entry. Confusing ‘seller pays the freight’ with ‘seller is responsible for import’ is a recurring and avoidable error in CPT contracts.

Because the buyer is the one filing the import entry, the buyer needs a customs bond and an importer number in place before the shipment lands, the same requirement that applies under DAP and every other rule that leaves import clearance with the buyer. A licensed customs brokerage that has actually filed entries, not just advised on them, is the fastest way to confirm that requirement is met before the goods are en route rather than after they arrive and the clock on the clearance process starts running.

For shippers weighing CPT against the full set of Incoterms® 2020 rules, the Incoterms 2020 chart lays out how CPT, DAP, and the other rules compare on carriage, insurance, and risk transfer side by side, and strong trade compliance management practices make the choice between them a formality rather than a source of disputes at the port.

Frequently Asked Questions

DAP, Delivered at Place, is one of the seven Incoterms® 2020 rules that work for any mode of transport. Under DAP the seller delivers once the goods are placed at the buyer’s disposal on the arriving means of transport, ready for unloading, at the named destination; the seller carries the cost and risk of getting the goods there, but the buyer is left holding import customs clearance, duties, and unloading. That one allocation, import formalities sit with the buyer, is the detail most freight-marketing explainers skip past, and it is the detail that actually determines whether a shipment clears on schedule.

This guide covers where risk transfers under DAP Incoterms, who ends up as the importer of record, what happens when a buyer has no customs bond or import license on file, and how DAP compares to its two closest relatives, DPU and DDP. It is written from the seat of a licensed customs house broker who files the entries against these rules, not from a generic freight-marketing summary.

What DAP Means Under Incoterms® 2020

DAP belongs to the Incoterms® 2020 rules that apply to any mode of transport, alongside EXW, FCA, CPT, CIP, DPU, and DDP. That distinguishes it from the sea-and-inland-waterway-only rules, FAS and FOB, which cannot be used correctly for an air shipment or a full truckload move even though shippers try it constantly.

DAP is also a ‘D’ rule, meaning the seller bears both the cost of carriage and the risk of loss or damage all the way to the named destination. That is a materially heavier obligation than the ‘C’ rules, where the seller pays for carriage but risk passes to the buyer much earlier. CPT and the other ‘C’ rules split cost and risk that way; DAP does not. Under DAP the seller is on the hook for both cost and risk until the goods reach the named place.

The named place has to be specific enough that both parties can point to the exact spot where delivery happens, a street address, a named terminal, a specific yard, not just a city. A vague named place is the single most common drafting error in a DAP contract and it produces genuine disputes over where risk actually transferred when something goes wrong in transit.

Where and When Risk Passes From Seller to Buyer

Under DAP the seller has delivered, and risk has passed, the moment the goods are placed at the buyer’s disposal on the arriving means of transport, ready for unloading, at the named place of destination. The goods do not need to be unloaded. They only need to be ready for the buyer to unload them.

Until that point the seller carries the risk of loss or damage through every leg of the move: export haulage, ocean or air carriage, transshipment, inland trucking to the final destination. If the cargo is damaged in a port terminal two days before arrival at the named place, that loss falls on the seller, not the buyer, because delivery has not yet occurred.

The ‘ready for unloading’ standard is precise for a reason: it is what separates DAP from DPU. DAP stops one step short of unloading. If the parties actually want the seller to unload the goods, and to carry the risk of that unloading operation, the correct rule is DPU, not DAP with extra language bolted on.

Incoterms® 2020 rules generally do not obligate either party to buy cargo insurance; DAP is no exception. The seller carries the risk of physical loss or damage until delivery, but that is not the same as being contractually required to insure against it. In practice most sellers insure a DAP shipment anyway, since an uninsured loss in transit falls on their own balance sheet, but the decision, and the cost, sits outside the Incoterm itself and belongs in the sale contract or the seller’s standing cargo policy.

Who Pays Duty and Who Is the Importer of Record Under DAP

The buyer pays import duty under DAP. The seller’s obligation ends at delivery to the named place; everything downstream of that, import customs clearance, duty and tax payment, and unloading, is the buyer’s responsibility. In US Customs and Border Protection practice, the buyer is the party who must appear as the importer of record on the entry, whether that is the buyer itself or a party the buyer designates.

Duty owed is calculated as a percentage of the declared customs value, not the DAP delivered price on the commercial invoice. The two numbers are related but not identical once freight, insurance, and certain other charges are added back or excluded under the valuation rules, which is one more reason the buyer’s customs broker, not the seller, needs to be doing that math.

Here is the operational consequence almost nobody covering DAP actually explains: a buyer needs an importer number, and for a formal entry, generally a customs bond, before the shipment lands. If neither is in place when the goods arrive, the entry cannot be filed. Under 19 CFR 4.37, merchandise must be entered within 15 calendar days of landing or it becomes general order cargo, moved into a bonded general-order warehouse at the importer’s expense while duties and storage charges keep accruing. Left unclaimed for 6 months, it is treated as abandoned under 19 CFR Part 127 and can be sold at public auction.

That timeline is exactly why the choice between DAP and DDP matters more than the Incoterm label suggests, and it is where a licensed customs brokerage earns its fee before the ship even docks, not after. CargoTrans has filed entries at ports across the country since 1989, and the recurring pattern is the same: the shipment itself is rarely the problem, the buyer’s missing bond or import license is. Confirming that paperwork is in place, and walking a first-time importer through the customs clearance process before cargo departs, prevents almost every DAP entry delay we see.

DAP vs DDP: The Difference That Trips Up Most Shippers

Under DAP, the buyer clears the goods for import and pays duty. Under DDP, the seller does both: the seller clears the goods for import, pays the duty, and delivers them ready for unloading at the named place, cleared. That single reversal changes who has to act as the importer of record, and for a seller with no legal presence in the destination country, becoming the importer of record is rarely simple.

The full DAP vs DDP comparison covers why DDP is often impractical for a foreign seller without a US presence, including the resident-agent and bond requirements a nonresident corporation has to satisfy to enter merchandise for consumption in its own name. The short version: DAP quotes a lower landed price because duty is excluded, and it puts the compliance burden on the party that actually has standing to import.

DAP vs DPU: Does the Seller Have to Unload the Goods?

DAP and DPU are nearly identical rules with one difference: unloading. Under DAP, the seller delivers the goods on the arriving means of transport, ready for unloading, and the buyer unloads them. Under DPU, Delivered at Place Unloaded, the seller must also unload the goods at the named place before delivery is considered complete, which also means the seller carries the risk of that unloading operation.

DPU is the only Incoterms® 2020 rule that requires the seller to unload the goods. It replaced Delivered at Terminal from the 2010 rules and dropped the word ‘terminal’ specifically so the named place could be anywhere the parties agree, a warehouse, a job site, a distribution center, not only a port or rail terminal.

Which rule fits depends entirely on who has the equipment and the local knowledge to unload safely at the named place. A buyer receiving heavy machinery at a facility without a forklift or dock has a real reason to negotiate DPU instead of DAP; a buyer with its own receiving operation usually prefers DAP, since it avoids making the seller responsible for an unloading process it does not control.

When DAP Makes Sense and When It Doesn't

DAP works well when the buyer is an experienced importer with an existing bond, an importer number, and a broker relationship already in place, and simply wants the seller to manage transportation risk up to the door. It also works cleanly for any mode of transport, which makes it a reasonable substitute for the sea-only FAS and FOB rules on an air or multimodal shipment where those rules cannot legally apply.

It is also worth stating what DAP is not. It is not a customs-cleared price, so a buyer comparing a DAP quote to a DDP quote from a different supplier is not comparing like for like until duty, taxes, and clearance fees are added to the DAP figure. And it is not EXW with extra steps: under EXW the buyer arranges and pays for every leg, including export haulage from the seller’s own premises, while DAP keeps the entire outbound and international leg on the seller’s side of the ledger.

DAP is a poor fit when the buyer is a first-time importer, when the commodity requires an import license or permit the buyer has not yet secured, or when the parties have not confirmed who is actually going to unload the cargo at a destination without dock access. In all three cases, the fix is not to abandon DAP reflexively, it is to confirm the buyer’s trade compliance readiness before the goods leave origin, which is a cheaper conversation to have on day one than after a shipment sits in general order.

For a full side-by-side of all 11 Incoterms® 2020 rules, including where CPT, DAP, DPU, and DDP diverge on cost and risk, see the Incoterms 2020 chart.

Frequently Asked Questions

A Canada non resident importer can become the importer of record for shipments entering the United States without opening a US office, a US subsidiary, or holding US citizenship, provided it has a US customs bond and a valid CBP importer number. The same non-resident importer, or NRI, structure is open to any foreign company, not only Canadian ones, and CBP’s own C-TPAT program formally recognizes it: eligibility for the importer category is defined as being an active US importer or non-resident Canadian importer.

This guide walks a foreign company, Canadian or otherwise, through what it actually needs to import into the US as the importer of record, where a physical US address is and isn’t required, and the mistakes that cause NRI shipments to stall at the border.

What a Non-Resident Importer Is

Under 19 U.S.C. 1484, an entry can be made by the owner, the purchaser, or a licensed customs broker appointed by one of them, and nothing in that statute requires the owner or purchaser to be a US resident or a US-incorporated company. A foreign company can be the importer of record on its own US-bound shipments, taking on the same duty and compliance obligations a domestic importer carries.

The question comes up most often from Canadian companies for a practical reason: instead of selling to a US buyer and leaving import clearance to them, a Canadian exporter can control its own customs clearance process, set its own delivered pricing, and manage duty exposure directly, rather than handing that leverage to the customer on the other side of the border.

The same structure applies to a European, Asian, or Latin American exporter selling directly to US customers; nothing about the non-resident importer mechanism is Canada-specific. Canada dominates the search volume around this question simply because cross-border shipping volume between the two countries is high and the trip is short enough that a Canadian company can plausibly manage US customs obligations itself rather than depending on a US-based buyer or distributor to do it.

Can a Canada Non Resident Importer Ship Directly Into the US?

Yes. A Canada non resident importer files entries the same way a US-based importer does, through a licensed broker acting on its behalf, and is bound by the same reasonable-care obligations under 19 U.S.C. 1484. What differs is the paperwork needed to establish its identity with CBP in the first place, since it typically has no IRS tax filing history to draw on.

None of the merchandise itself is treated differently because the importer is foreign. Classification, valuation, and admissibility rules apply exactly as they would to a domestic importer’s shipment; the differences described in this guide are entirely about how the importer establishes and documents its identity, its bond, and its authorized agent with CBP before that first entry is filed.

Getting a US Importer of Record Number Without a US Business

Every importer needs an Importer of Record number to file entries, and that number is normally an IRS-issued Employer Identification Number for a company, or a Social Security Number for an individual. A foreign company that has neither uses CBP Form 5106, the Create/Update Importer Identity Form, checking the box requesting a CBP-assigned number instead. CBP then issues that number and it is used on every future transaction requiring one.

This is a one-time setup step, not a recurring filing. Once CBP has issued the number, it functions on every subsequent entry summary exactly the way an EIN or SSN would. A licensed customs brokerage that regularly works with foreign importers can usually walk a new NRI through this setup before its first shipment leaves the origin country.

The US Customs Bond Every NRI Needs

A non-resident importer needs a US customs bond the same way any importer of a formal entry does, underwritten by a surety listed on Treasury Department Circular 570. A foreign company shipping once or occasionally can use a single entry bond; one planning a regular US import program is generally better served by a continuous bond covering every entry for a year.

There is no separate, lighter bonding standard for non-resident importers. CBP’s C-TPAT eligibility criteria make that point explicitly for the importer category, requiring a valid continuous import bond registered with CBP whether the applicant is a US importer or a non-resident Canadian importer.

Do You Need a US Address or a Resident Agent?

Being the importer of record does not itself require a physical US office or place of business; that is the entire point of the non-resident importer structure. What it does require, if the foreign company grants a customs power of attorney to its broker, is a resident agent: under 19 CFR 141.36, a power of attorney executed by a nonresident principal is only accepted if the designated agent is a US resident authorized to accept service of process against that nonresident.

In practice this resident-agent condition is satisfied through the broker relationship itself, not a separate physical office lease. It is worth confirming explicitly with your broker rather than assuming a courier address or a freight forwarder’s warehouse automatically qualifies.

DDP Sellers Are Already Acting Like Non-Resident Importers

A foreign seller who quotes Delivered Duty Paid (DDP) terms is contractually taking on the buyer’s import clearance and duty payment obligations in the destination country, which functionally makes that seller a non-resident importer whether or not it ever registered as one. The obligations described above, an importer number, a bond, and an authorized agent, do not disappear because the term of sale was chosen for pricing reasons rather than a deliberate import strategy.

The risk shows up at the worst possible time: a DDP shipment arrives with no importer number and no bond in place, and it sits at the port while the seller scrambles to set up exactly the paperwork this guide describes, on a deadline it does not control. A seller quoting DDP into the US regularly is better off setting up the entry summary filing relationship in advance rather than treating each shipment as a one-off.

Common Mistakes and Building Trusted-Importer Status

The recurring failure pattern is sequencing: a foreign company arranges the sale and the shipment before arranging the importer number, the bond, and the power of attorney, then treats the resulting hold at the border as a carrier or broker problem rather than a paperwork gap it created. Confusing “no US office required” with “no US paperwork required” is the single most common version of this mistake.

A second, quieter mistake is treating the first successful entry as proof the program is set up correctly. A single shipment can clear on a single entry bond and a hastily assembled importer number and still leave real trade compliance management gaps in recordkeeping, classification consistency, and valuation documentation unaddressed until CBP asks for them on the fifth or fifteenth entry instead of the first.

For a non-resident importer with an established, recurring US program, C-TPAT certification is available on the same terms as a domestic importer, provided it has been actively importing for the past 12 months, holds a valid continuous bond, and operates a staffed business office in the United States or Canada. That status brings fewer exams and faster release, and it signals to CBP, and to US customers, that the import program is run properly rather than assembled shipment by shipment.

Frequently Asked Questions