u/aaryawny

I keep seeing exporters leave GST refunds on the table.
This becomes especially painful in businesses like jewellery, where the GST numbers can get complicated.
You might have significant ITC sitting across procurement, job work, logistics, professional services, etc. And then you’re exporting most of your output.
But the refund calculation and the route to claim it aren’t always straightforward.
What surprised me is how often exporters simply don’t claim the refund, or their CA handles it manually without really analysing the underlying transaction data.

There are also cases where people confuse the different refund routes, especially LUT/zero-rated export refunds and inverted duty structure refunds.
The result?
ITC accumulates. Cash stays stuck. Nobody notices.

This is one of the workflows we’re building at Seasaw AI
Instead of asking a CA to manually go through thousands of invoices and export transactions, we’re building AI agents that can analyse the data, identify potentially eligible ITC, flag issues and prepare the refund workflow.

Curious to hear from exporters and CAs here:
How do you currently calculate and claim your GST refunds?
Is this something your CA handles end-to-end, or do you have an internal process for it?

I have been looking into the cost of shipping bill closure and RBI EDPMS regularisation, and something really surprised me.
Some exporters are being charged Rs 500 to Rs 800 per shipping bill by banks for closure or regularisation.
At Rs 800 per bill:
1,200 bills x Rs 800 = Rs 9,60,000
That is almost Rs 10 lakh just to close 1,200 shipping bills.

The bigger problem is that many exporters do not know the right way to approach the bank.

There can be different reasons why a shipping bill remains open, including payment mapping issues, documentation gaps, FIRA or FIRC issues, IRM mismatches, partial realisation, old transactions, incorrect purpose codes and other compliance issues.

So exporters often end up paying whatever the bank quotes, sending multiple requests, following up for weeks or paying consultants without really knowing what needs to be fixed.

We started working on this problem with SeaSaw AI.
We help exporters identify what is actually pending, prepare the required documentation and requests, and negotiate with banks for better closure rates.

In some cases, we have been able to reduce the effective cost by around 90 percent.
The interesting part is that many exporters may not actually need to pay the original amount being quoted.

They just need to know the right process and how to approach the bank.

Curious to know what exporters here are being charged for EDPMS or shipping bill closure.
Would be interesting to compare rates across banks.

Your bank may be closing your less than ₹10L shipping bills in EDPMS without creating IRM entries, which silently kills your eBRC and GST refund

Sharing this because we met an exporter it happened to and almost nobody catches it until refund time.

Background for anyone new to this. When you export under LUT, your shipping bill sits in the bank's EDPMS as an outstanding export. When the foreign payment lands, the bank is supposed to create an IRM entry for the inward remittance and map it to the shipping bill. That mapping is what lets you generate the eBRC on DGFT, and the eBRC is what you need for your GST refund and benefits like RoDTEP.

In October 2025 RBI issued Circular No. 12, which lets banks close EDPMS bills of 10 lakh or less on a simple self-declaration that the money was realised. Good relief for small exporters.

The problem is how some banks are using it. They mark the bill as closed and realised, but never create the IRM entry or map it to the shipment. On the bank screen it looks done. But with no IRM linked:

your eBRC cannot be generated,
your GST refund stalls,
and your RoDTEP and other benefits are exposed.

It is silent. The exporter thinks the bill is regularised and only finds out months later when the refund will not move. We even saw banks pushing exporters to declare "no IRM received" in exchange for cheaper rates, which quietly signs away the refund trail.

I have been looking into the cost of shipping bill closure and RBI EDPMS regularisation, and something really surprised me.
Some exporters are being charged Rs 500 to Rs 800 per shipping bill by banks for closure or regularisation.
At Rs 800 per bill:
1,200 bills x Rs 800 = Rs 9,60,000
That is almost Rs 10 lakh just to close 1,200 shipping bills.

The bigger problem is that many exporters do not know the right way to approach the bank.

There can be different reasons why a shipping bill remains open, including payment mapping issues, documentation gaps, FIRA or FIRC issues, IRM mismatches, partial realisation, old transactions, incorrect purpose codes and other compliance issues.

So exporters often end up paying whatever the bank quotes, sending multiple requests, following up for weeks or paying consultants without really knowing what needs to be fixed.

We started working on this problem with SeaSaw AI.
We help exporters identify what is actually pending, prepare the required documentation and requests, and negotiate with banks for better closure rates.

In some cases, we have been able to reduce the effective cost by around 90 percent.
The interesting part is that many exporters may not actually need to pay the original amount being quoted.

They just need to know the right process and how to approach the bank.

Curious to know what exporters here are being charged for EDPMS or shipping bill closure.
Would be interesting to compare rates across banks.

I have been looking into the cost of shipping bill closure and RBI EDPMS regularisation, and something really surprised me.
Some exporters are being charged Rs 500 to Rs 800 per shipping bill by banks for closure or regularisation.
At Rs 800 per bill:
1,200 bills x Rs 800 = Rs 9,60,000
That is almost Rs 10 lakh just to close 1,200 shipping bills.

The bigger problem is that many exporters do not know the right way to approach the bank.

There can be different reasons why a shipping bill remains open, including payment mapping issues, documentation gaps, FIRA or FIRC issues, IRM mismatches, partial realisation, old transactions, incorrect purpose codes and other compliance issues.

So exporters often end up paying whatever the bank quotes, sending multiple requests, following up for weeks or paying consultants without really knowing what needs to be fixed.

We started working on this problem with SeaSaw AI.
We help exporters identify what is actually pending, prepare the required documentation and requests, and negotiate with banks for better closure rates.

In some cases, we have been able to reduce the effective cost by around 90 percent.
The interesting part is that many exporters may not actually need to pay the original amount being quoted.

They just need to know the right process and how to approach the bank.

Curious to know what exporters here are being charged for EDPMS or shipping bill closure.
Would be interesting to compare rates across banks.

Hey everyone! I’m u/aaryawny, a founding moderator of r/SeasawAI.

This is a home for anyone dealing with Indian EXIM compliance — imports and exports both. EDPMS and IDPMS, FEMA, IRM creation, bills of entry, eBRC, customs, DGFT, GST refunds, and the endless back and forth with AD banks. Exporters, importers, CAs, CHAs, freight and ops people, all welcome. If you have ever had a shipping bill sit pending for two years, or a bill of entry stuck outstanding in IDPMS with no idea why, you are in the right place.

How to Get Started

**1.**	Introduce yourself below: what you import or export, which banks you deal with, what is currently stuck.  
**2.**	Post something today. Even a small question helps someone searching for it later.  
**3.**	Invite anyone who would find this useful.  
**4.**	Want to help moderate? Reach out.

One plug and then I’ll stop: I build Seasaw, which automates most of this. If you want to try it, DM me.