How to Fill Out and Submit Form ITA-338P: Duty-Free Entry of Scientific Instruments

To fill out Form ITA-338P, a nonprofit scientific or educational institution identifies itself and its nonprofit status, describes the foreign instrument and its guaranteed specifications, explains the research or teaching purpose the instrument will serve, and shows that no domestic instrument is scientifically equivalent for that purpose. Five copies of the completed form (one with an original signature) go by mail to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which forwards the application to the Commerce Department’s Statutory Import Programs Staff for review under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 9810.00.60.¹

Before You Start

Only public or private nonprofit institutions established for scientific or educational purposes may file the form.² The form asks you to check whether your institution is scientific or educational and to document your nonprofit status. Listing in IRS Publication 78 works; so does an IRS determination letter or comparable documentation.³ For-profit companies and individuals outside an eligible institution cannot use this form.

The item you are importing must also fit the regulatory definition of an instrument. That definition covers instruments and apparatus falling within specific tariff provisions listed in U.S. Note 6(a) to Subchapter X, Chapter 98 of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, together with accessories and spare parts normally sold and ordered with the base instrument. It excludes consumables, building and administrative equipment, general-purpose items like refrigerators or electric drills, and standalone general-purpose computers. Scientific instruments with embedded computers dedicated to instrument control still qualify.⁴

Completing the Form

The form is a numbered questionnaire. Work through it in order and use separate sheets, keyed to question numbers, whenever an answer needs more room than the form provides.²

Institutional Information and Nonprofit Status

Enter your institution’s name and address, check the applicable category (scientific or educational), and attach or reference your proof of nonprofit status. You must also certify in writing that the instrument will not be used by, or for the primary benefit of, any commercial entity within five years after it enters U.S. customs territory.³

Identifying the Instrument

Identify the foreign instrument by the manufacturer’s own nomenclature and model number. List each accompanying accessory the same way. If the instrument has already been delivered, include its serial number. If it has already entered U.S. customs territory, attach a copy of the CBP Form 7501 entry summary. If it has not yet entered, arrange for the person responsible for the purchase or your customs broker to fax the CBP 7501 to the Statutory Import Programs Staff at 202-501-7952 once it arrives.³

Technical Specifications

Attach the foreign manufacturer’s literature describing the instrument and its guaranteed specifications, including all accessories. Present the specifications so they can be compared directly with those of comparable domestic instruments, because that comparison is the basis for the Commerce Department’s decision. If you ordered a modified version of a standard model, explain how each performance specification differs from the standard. For custom-built instruments, provide documentation showing how the instrument meets your specific requirements or where it deviates from them.⁵

Research or Educational Purpose

Question 7 asks what the instrument will actually be used for. Name the materials or phenomena you intend to study and explain how the instrument will be used to accomplish those goals. General phrasing like “laboratory research” will not carry the application. The Commerce Department uses your stated purpose to judge whether domestic alternatives would serve the same function.³ An intended use that is exclusively nonscientific will be denied on the ground that the instrument has no scientific value for its stated purpose.⁶

Comparison With Domestic Instruments

This section decides most applications. Identify any comparable domestic instruments by manufacturer and model, then describe the specific design, performance, and operational characteristics of the foreign instrument that no domestic alternative can match. Quantify wherever possible. Stating that the foreign instrument achieves a resolution of 0.1 nanometers where the best domestic option reaches only 1 nanometer is the kind of concrete comparison the reviewer needs.⁵

Then connect those characteristics to your research: explain how the specific capability lets you accomplish work that could not be done with the domestic instrument. Only guaranteed specifications count in the review. Advertised performance that exceeds what the manufacturer formally guarantees is not weighed. Speculative future uses carry no weight either.⁶

Delivery Time as an Alternative Justification

If you are choosing the foreign instrument because of delivery time rather than a technical gap, a separate justification applies. State and verify the delivery times quoted by both the domestic and foreign manufacturers, then explain why the domestic delay would seriously impair your research or educational goals, and identify exactly which purposes would be affected.³

Submitting the Application

Mail five copies of the completed application to the address printed on the form. One copy must bear an original signature; photocopied signatures are acceptable on the other four.³ The address:

U.S. Customs and Border Protection
Attention: Entry Process and Duty Refunds Branch
90 K Street, NE, 10th Floor
Washington, DC 20229⁷

Blank forms are available from the Statutory Import Programs Staff at the International Trade Administration.² Current contacts for procedural questions are Tyler O’Daniel and Eva Kim, reachable through the ITA’s Statutory Import Programs page.⁷

What Reviewers Look For After You File

CBP forwards the application to the Commerce Department, where the Director of Statutory Import Programs reviews it. Within five days of receipt, if the application is complete enough to evaluate on the merits, the Director publishes a notice in the Federal Register and opens a 20-day public comment period. Domestic manufacturers can use that window to argue that a scientifically equivalent domestic instrument exists.⁸ Applications that are too vague to evaluate, especially in the description of intended purpose, can be rejected before ever reaching the Federal Register.

The equivalency test is mechanical, which is why the specifications section matters so much. If a domestic instrument possesses all of the foreign instrument’s pertinent specifications, the Director will find an equivalent exists and deny the application. If the foreign instrument has even one pertinent specification that no domestic instrument can match, the application is approved. The Director may also accept a reasonable combination of domestic instruments as equivalent, so long as they form an integrated unit capable of accomplishing your stated purpose.⁶

Claiming Duty-Free Entry at the Port

Duty-free classification under subheading 9810.00.60 is claimed when the instrument enters U.S. customs territory. If you present a copy of the application stamped by CBP as accepted for transmittal to Commerce, no estimated duty deposit is required at entry. If you make the claim without the stamped form in hand, CBP will require a deposit of estimated duties, and you must file the stamped form before the entry is liquidated. Miss that window and the instrument is classified and assessed duties in the ordinary course.⁶

Some institutions wait for the Director’s final decision before importing, using deferred shipment, a bonded warehouse, or a foreign trade zone. If you take that route, three things must be presented at entry: the stamped application, your copy of the favorable final determination, and proof that you placed a bona fide order within 60 days after that favorable decision became final. The 60-day ordering deadline is enforced by the tariff schedule itself.¹

The Five-Year Commercial Use Restriction

Approval carries a binding condition. For five years after entry, the instrument must be used exclusively by and for your institution. It cannot be sold, distributed, or put to commercial use. If it is, your institution must promptly notify customs officials at the port of entry and pay the duties that would have applied without subheading 9810.00.60, based on the instrument’s condition as imported.¹

You may transfer the instrument to another eligible nonprofit institution during the five-year window, but title must pass directly and the receiving institution must agree not to use it commercially for the remainder of the period. The transferring institution notifies its CBP port in writing, giving both institutions’ names and addresses, the transfer date, a description of the instrument with serial numbers, and the original entry number and port. CBP port directors verify compliance with the restriction periodically.⁹

1
U.S. International Trade Commission. HTS Subheading 9810.00.60
2
eCFR. 15 CFR 301.3 – Application for Duty-Free Entry of Scientific Instruments
3
International Trade Administration. ITA-338P – Request for Duty-Free Entry of Scientific Instruments or Apparatus
4
eCFR. 15 CFR 301.2 – Definitions
5
International Trade Administration. Request for Duty-Free Entry of Scientific Instruments or Apparatus
6
eCFR. 15 CFR Part 301 – Instruments and Apparatus for Educational and Scientific Institutions
7
International Trade Administration. Statutory Import Programs
8
eCFR. 15 CFR 301.5 – Processing of Applications by the Department of Commerce
9
U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Customs Directive 3550-073A – Duty-Free Entry of Scientific Instruments