Customs power of attorney, explained

A customs power of attorney is an agency instrument. It appoints a licensed broker as your attorney-in-fact for customs purposes so that CBP will accept filings made in your name by someone who is not you. Under 19 CFR 141.46 a broker has to hold a valid POA before transacting customs business for a principal, which is why no serious brokerage will touch a shipment without one on file. The requirements sit in 19 CFR part 141, subpart C.

What the document is

19 CFR 141.32 provides the standard wording, printed as CBP Form 5291, and permits a form that is substantially the same. The grant can be general, covering all customs business, or limited to particular entries or a particular period. Almost every commercial importer executes a general POA, because one limited to a single shipment has to be re-executed for the next, usually at the worst possible moment.

The form itself is short. What matters is who the grantor is, the grantor's importer of record number, the exact legal name and state or country of organisation, and the authority of the person signing. Those four fields are where the errors happen, and a POA naming an entity that does not match the importer number on the entry is worth nothing at all.

What it lets us do

• Transmit cargo release and entry summary data in your name, the filings behind CBP Form 3461 and CBP Form 7501, and sign the entry as your agent.
• File the Importer Security Filing for ocean cargo under 19 CFR part 149.
• Apply for a customs bond on your behalf and execute it on CBP Form 301.
• Pay duties, taxes and fees to CBP from funds you provide, and handle statement processing.
• Correspond with CBP and the partner agencies about your entries, including a response to a CF-28 request for information or a CF-29 notice of action, post-summary corrections and protests.
• Make declarations of fact on your behalf, which is exactly why the information you give us has to be right.

What it does not do

It does not make us the importer. You remain the importer of record, and 19 U.S.C. 1484 keeps the reasonable care obligation with you. A penalty under 19 U.S.C. 1592 is assessed against the importer of record. It does not make us liable for your duties, and it is not a bond: that is a separate instrument with a surety behind it. It is also not exclusive. You can hold valid POAs with several brokers at once without conflict, which is normal for importers who use different brokers at different ports.

Nor does it let us hand your customs business to someone else. Only a licensed broker may conduct customs business for compensation, and 19 CFR 111.36 constrains a broker's dealings with unlicensed parties. If a forwarder asks you to sign a POA in favour of a brokerage you have never spoken to, ask who is actually filing and who will answer for the entry. Your name is on it either way.

Who has authority to sign

The signer must be able to bind the grantor. For a corporation that is normally the president, a vice president, the secretary or the treasurer, or an employee holding a delegation evidenced by a corporate resolution. For a partnership it is a general partner, for an LLC a member or manager, for a sole proprietorship the proprietor. The standard form carries a certification block in which a corporate officer attests that the signer holds the authority claimed, and 19 CFR 141.37 lets CBP demand further evidence of that authority at any point.

Since CBP's 2022 broker modernization rule, brokers also have to collect and retain specific evidence identifying the client rather than accepting a signature at face value. Expect us to ask for formation documents, the EIN assignment, and identification for the signer. That is a regulatory obligation on our side, not paperwork for its own sake, and a brokerage that skips it is telling you something about how it files.

If the importer is not a US company

A foreign entity can grant a customs POA and can be the importer of record. The practical constraint is 19 CFR 141.18: a nonresident corporation generally cannot enter merchandise unless it has a resident agent in the state where the entry is filed, authorised to accept service of process. Settle that at the same time as the POA, because it also governs who can execute the bond.

How long it lasts, and how to end it

A POA granted by a corporation has no expiry date. It stays in force until revoked. A POA granted by a partnership is different: 19 CFR 141.34 limits it to two years from the date of execution, so partnerships re-sign on a cycle. Revocation is by written notice under 19 CFR 141.35, and it takes effect when received, not when you decide.

Revoking undoes nothing. Entries already filed remain your entries, liquidation still runs on them, and both you and the former broker keep the records for five years under 19 CFR 163.4. If you change brokers, put it in writing and make sure open entries have an owner, because a protest deadline does not pause while two brokerages work out whose file it is.

Signing it electronically

CBP accepts electronically executed powers of attorney, and most brokerages now collect them through a portal rather than by fax. The substance does not change: the same wording, the same authority requirements, the same identity evidence. What changes is that the signed document, the audit trail and the supporting records land in one place instead of three, which matters five years later when CBP asks for the file.

Related reading: what the broker licence actually covers and how a customs bond is sized.