The DGFT Compliance Checklist Every Exporter Should Keep
Export compliance rarely fails at the dramatic moments. It fails on a stale registration, a port with no AD code, a purpose code that tells the wrong story. This is the recurring checklist that keeps the small things from becoming the expensive things.
The identity layer: IEC
The Importer Exporter Code is the registration every certificate, claim, and filing hangs off. Two habits keep it healthy: confirm the IEC's details still match the business as it exists today (address, entity name, bank), and complete its periodic update in the window DGFT prescribes. A filing made against outdated IEC particulars is a correction waiting to happen.
The banking layer: AD codes
Your Authorised Dealer bank's AD code must be registered at every port you ship from, through the ICEGATE customs portal. The classic failure is expansion: a new port, a first shipment, and a consignment standing still because the code that works in Nhava Sheva was never registered in Mundra. Keep a simple list: every port you use, the AD code registered there, and the date you last confirmed it.
The narrative layer: purpose codes
Every inward remittance carries an RBI purpose code describing what the money is for. When the code on the remittance does not match the nature of the export it pays for, reconciliation stalls. The fix is upstream: tell your buyers and your bank which purpose code your exports correspond to, and check the code on each remittance when it arrives, not when a certificate rejects.
The clock layer: realisation deadlines
FEMA expects export proceeds to be realised within the period the RBI prescribes, set out in the RBI Master Direction on Export of Goods and Services and revised from time to time. That makes every open invoice a quiet countdown. A monthly look at unrealised exports, oldest first, is the difference between following up with a buyer at leisure and explaining a lapse to a bank under pressure. Check the current Master Direction for the realisation period that applies to you, since it has changed in recent years.
The evidence layer: certificates
Realisation closes with the eBRC. Certificates should be generated while the paperwork is warm, downloaded as PDFs, and the ledger exported to Excel at whatever rhythm your audits run. Available balances on certificates are claims not yet made; review them alongside the checklist so compliance and incentives move together.
Keep it recurring
None of this is difficult. All of it decays. Put the checklist on a monthly cadence, attach it to the same twenty minutes as your remittance housekeeping, and the compliance layer of exporting becomes what it should be: quiet.
Frequently asked questions
What is an IEC and where do I get it?
The Importer Exporter Code is your export registration, issued by the DGFT. Every eBRC, incentive claim, and shipping bill hangs off it, so keep its particulars current and complete its periodic update on time.
Where is an AD code registered?
Your Authorised Dealer bank issues the AD code, and you register it at each port of shipment through the ICEGATE customs portal. Without it registered at a port, you cannot file a shipping bill there. See AD code explained.
What is the export realisation deadline?
FEMA requires export proceeds to be realised within the period the RBI prescribes in its Master Direction on Export of Goods and Services. That period has been revised in recent years, so check the current Master Direction rather than an old figure.
