Customs refund on allegedly defective imports fails where unusability does not prove nil assessable value.

Refund of customs duty was denied because the importer did not substantiate that the spinnerettes were defective or that the shipment was a wrong supply with nil assessable value. The correspondence and surrounding circumstances did not show acceptance of any defect by the supplier, and the goods could not be treated as valueless merely because the importer found them unusable. A claim that the goods had no value to the importer was insufficient, by itself, to establish a nil customs value. The refund claim therefore failed.

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Issues: Whether the appellant was entitled to refund of customs duty on the basis that the imported spinnerettes were defective or constituted wrong supply and, therefore, had nil value for the purpose of duty assessment.

Analysis: The claim for refund was examined against the documentary correspondence and the surrounding circumstances. The material did not establish that the goods were defective in the sense contended by the appellant. The correspondence also indicated that the supplier had not accepted any defect and that the matter could equally be one of wrong supply. On that footing, the goods could not be treated as valueless for all purposes merely because the importer found them unusable. A claim that the goods had no value to the importer did not, by itself, establish that the assessable value under the Customs Act was nil.

Conclusion: The refund claim was not substantiated, and the appeal failed.

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