Under a classic FOB contract, a seller places the goods on board the ship, and procures a bill of lading in terms usual in the trade. The buyer nominates the shipper and bears all the expenses associated with the vessel including port charges, freight, customs duties, storage and arrivals charges. However, the parties to the contract of carriage can by express agreement depart from or vary their respective responsibilities. Devlin J said: ‘. The phrase ‘shall properly and carefully load’ may mean that the carrier shall load and that he shall do it properly and carefully: or that he shall do whatever loading he does properly and carefully. The former interpretation perhaps fits the language more closely, but the latter may be more consistent with the object of the rules. Their object as it is put, I think, correctly in Carver’s Carriage of Goods by Sea, 9th ed. (1952), p. 186, is to define not the scope of the contract service but the terms on which that service is to be performed. The extent to which the carrier has to undertake the loading of the vessel may depend not only upon different systems of law but upon the custom and practice of the port and the nature of the cargo. It is difficult to believe that the rules were intended to impose a universal rigidity in this respect, or to deny freedom of contract to the carrier. The carrier is practically bound to play some part in the loading and discharging, so that both operations are naturally included in those covered by the contract of carriage. But I see no reason why the rules should not leave the parties free to determine by their own contract the part which each has to play. On this view the whole contract of carriage is subject to the rules, but the extent to which loading and discharging are brought within the carrier’s obligations is left to the parties themselves to decide. ‘
Devlin J
[1954] 2 QB 402, [1954] 2 WLR 1005, [1954] 1 Lloyds Rep 321, [1954] 2 All ER 158
Hague-Visby Rules
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Parsons Corporation and others v C V Scheepvaartonderneming ‘The Happy Ranger’ CA 17-May-2002
There was a contact for the carriage by sea of three reactors. The contract applied the Hage-Visby rules.
Held: The contract applied the rules as they would apply in the country of shipment if they were applied mandatorily. The contact should . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Contract, Transport
Updated: 20 December 2021; Ref: scu.181086