Importer of record

The importer of record indicates the party responsible for paying customs duties, import taxes, shipping, and insurance charges for a sale. Depending on the Incoterms/delivery terms for a cross-border sale, either the seller or the buyer becomes the importer of record.

DDP (Delivery customs duty Paid): The seller is the importer of record.
DAP (Delivered at Place): The buyer is the importer of record.

A customer's policies and processes around designating an importer of record will vary:

Some customers always want to be importers of record.
Some customers never want to be importers of record.
Customer terms vary, depending on how you negotiated terms during a sale or in which country their buyer is located.

Note

As the seller, you can choose not to be the importer of record, but still act as the buyer's agent. In this case, you’ll collect the customs duty and import tax up front on behalf of the buyer and then pay the shipper all necessary charges for one or more items to clear through customs.

This is done by specifying "deliveryTerms": "DDP" along with "isSellerImporterOfRecord": "False".