Effective date of Shipment
I know that banks are involved only in checking documents and does not really care about the effective date of shipment. However, i came across some deals whereby the beneficiary is very much concerned to ensure a proper and clean negotiation of documents before practically making the shipment.
Is this something common? What are the benefits to the beneficiary?
Thanks,
It is a common practice for beneficiaries to want to have documents pre-checked against the L/C terms and conditions and , in some cases, lodged with the nominated bank prior to shipment. The benefit to the beneficiary is that he is comforted that errors in the documents that can be produced prior to shipment have been eliminated - all that is left are the extra details in the documents that cannot be issued until shipment occurs (Bill of Lading, Air Waybill etc.)
Pre-checking services by banks are common but usually expensive; also the banks tend to not give any guarantee of document acceptance until they have the full set of documents actually presented after shipment.
Hope that clarifies.
Elie, who told you that bank do not care about effective date of shipment, just want to correct you that we do care for effective date of shipment ....
Article 5 states bank deals with document not with goods.
Hence we are not bother of goods, and what exactly beneficiary is shipping, but we are strick in shipment date, if bene didnt ship on time, then will reject the documents.
Answer to your second half .. ask bene to opt for a confirmed LC ....
Mujeeb :-)
Regards!!!!
Mujeeb :-)
Let's agree on some terminologies. Effective date of shipment refers to the date when the ship leaves the dock i.e. starts its sail journey to the destination in question. In practice that could be different from the "Clean On Bord" date mentioned on the B/L which is the reference for banks to check against the latest date of shipment in the L/C to determine whether a B/L is compliant with the L/C terms or not.
Hope this clarifies.
Anyone with a good knowledge of both the shipping and trade finance industry to comment?
Elie
Banks usually do not care too much under sea shipments - but their disinterest is mainly caused by the applicants, which usually are not much interested either.
At least I never have any applicant demanding for effective shipment dates in B/Ls. Maybe this is mainly because nowadays ships only call for some hours at each port and are eager to leave again.
However, under air consignments where there is no such on board date, many banks demand for such effective shipment date in the AWB.
Hope this answer helped you?!
-Each long journey starts with a small step-
Best regards
Frammi
Date of Shipment means date of mate receipt(when vessel left the see shore)
Dear Frammi and Peter,
Thank you both for the valuable feedback.
Elie
Dear Elie,
As per my experience, There are three different dates in case of ocean shipments:
1. B/L Date
2. Date of loding
3. Date of Sailing
B/L Date may be prior to actual date of loading (container shipments, where B/L is issued by the carrier at the time of stuffing). In such cases, "Shipped on Board" stamp with date is obtained, which can be taken as date of loading.
In case of bulk cargos, B/L Date and date of loading is same.
Date of sailing is not shown in any document.
In case of L/c, date of loading is taken as "Shipment date".
Comments accepted.
Anup
elie i agree with mujeeb. the applicant/collecting bank can reject to honour the documents if the documents are not clean. further even if the documents are accepted and payments are effected the beneficary may end up receiving less payment because of the discrepancy and handling charge deducted by the collecting bank at the time of payment.
DEAR ALL
IF L/C IS CALLED FOR "SHIPPED ON BOARD" BILL OF LADING THEN ONLY ON BOARD DATE IS CONSIDER AS SHIPMENT DATE.
SOME SHIPPING COMPANY GIVE B/L ISSUE DATE AND SHIPPED ON BOARD DATE SEPARATELY IN THAT CASE ALSO SHIPMENT DATE IS SHIPPED ON BOARD DATE.
GENRALLY SOME SHIPPING COMPANY ISSUE BL AS:
1. RECEIVED FOR SHIPMENT DATE.
2. SHIPPED ON BOARD DATE
3. BL ISSUE DATE.
IN CASE RECEIVED FOR SHIPMENT THERE MAY BE TWO DATE ON BILL OF LADING BUT IN CASE OF "SHIPPED ON BOARD" BL IT IS BETTER TO GET ONLY ONE DATE THAT IS SHIPPED ON BOARD DATE.
REGARDS.
RAZIUR RAHMAN
DUBAI-U.A.E
Having read through the above comments I am faced with the following situation on which need your expert comments.
The LC calls for Bill of lading and Certifcate of origin among other docs.
The vessel took all cargo on board on 18th March and the vessel sailed the loading port on 19th March.
The B/L is dated 18th March i.e the date of issue. There is no other date mentioned on B/L.
However there is a field on certificate of origin which ask for "date of departure". Now shall we mention the B/L date or the date on which the vessel sailed. secondly is it right to consider or interpret the date of depature asked in certificate of sampling and analysis as date of shipment.
Third, will it be a discrepancy if certificate of origin contains date of departure as 19th March i.e the date the vessel sailed and the certificate is issued on 19th march itself and apart from this two dates there is no mention of any other date.
Rgds,
BP
Recent comments
1 hour 34 min ago
2 hours 8 min ago
1 day 7 hours ago
2 days 2 hours ago
3 days 3 hours ago
3 days 3 hours ago
3 days 8 hours ago
4 days 14 hours ago
4 days 16 hours ago
5 days 2 hours ago