Can a Carrier Name may appear on the reverse of B/L

murteza · Post by **murteza** » Fri May 22, 2009 8:44 pm

1 Can a name of the "Carrier" be stated on the reverse of an Bill of Lading instead on the Face? Please comment.
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B.regards

Judith · Post by **Judith** » Mon May 25, 2009 9:17 am

This would depend on where it appears in the reverse of the bill of lading.

Normally, only the terms and conditions of carriage are listed on the reverse of the bill of lading.

If the name of the carrier is contained in the terms and conditions of carriage, it would not be acceptable. This is because as per article 20 (a) (v), “Contents of terms and conditions of carriage will not be examined.”

Hope this helps.

pcdognicole · Post by **pcdognicole** » Mon May 25, 2009 3:08 pm

Refer UCP Article 20 stated "A bill of lading , however named, must appear to", the word "appear" means on the face of bill of lading, carrier name mention on the reverse of bill of lading is not acceptable.
In addition, Bank no need to check the terms and conditions of carrage on the bill of lading.

cristiand969 · Post by **cristiand969** » Mon May 25, 2009 4:36 pm

There were many ICC opinions answering to this question and the conclusion was that such indication of the carrier on the reverse of B/L is not acceptable.
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Judith, really enjoyed your analysis. Straight to the point

iLC · Post by **iLC** » Mon May 25, 2009 11:18 pm

i receive a good number of bill of lading which marks the terms and condition page as #1 and the data content page as #2. so there is no real meaning of front and back page. agree with judith. if one needs to enter the terms and condition to identify the carrier, its not acceptable though its a matter of fact that carrier is most often very clearly identified in the terms and condition pages and often does not match the carrier shown in the data content section

ldt5205 · Post by **ldt5205** » Tue May 26, 2009 5:40 am

I wonder why the carrier issues such B/L.
Is it crazy?
Such b/ls goes away the nomal way they are issued and will not be acceptable by banks.
The carrier will lose the transaction if it insist on issuing the BL this way.

Judith · Post by **Judith** » Tue May 26, 2009 9:05 am

Hi pcdognicole, You mentioned:

"the word "appear" means on the face of bill of lading, carrier name mention on the reverse of bill of lading is not acceptable."

That's not quite true. "On the face" of the document refers to anywhere on the document and not just the "front" page. If relevant information appears on the "reverse" page, the document checker cannot ignore such information.

In reference, here's the text from the Commentary to UCP 600:
"The concept of "on their face" does not refer to a simple front versus the back of a document, but extends to the review of data within a document in order to determine that a presentation complies..."

cristiand969 · Post by **cristiand969** » Tue May 26, 2009 2:14 pm

I guess a confusion has been made here.
Indeed ' appearing on their face' refers to the whole document not just a side of it.
However , ICC when defining the position of the carrier uses the wording ' the front of bill of lading being the one showing vessel name, POL and POD, - notwithstanding that in shipping industry is the opposite (that's why a BL is numbered : page 1 terms and conditions and page 2 details of carriage)

Judith · Post by **Judith** » Wed May 27, 2009 8:37 am

... ICC when defining the position of the carrier uses the wording ' the front of bill of lading...

I've been searching through the text of the UCP and ISBP and cannot find "front"... Could you let me where ICC has defined it?!

cristiand969 · Post by **cristiand969** » Wed May 27, 2009 12:56 pm

Dear Judith,
Although such definition is not found on UCP or ISBP the wording mentioned by me is to be found on Position papers 1,2,3,4 of which relevant content you may find below:

The name of the carrier must appear as such on the front of the document.
The expression 'the front of the document' means the side showing the details of the goods, vessel and voyage, and the expression 'the back of the document' means the side showing the details of the contract of carriage.
NOTE - Sub-paragraph (a)(v) of these UCP Articles states that banks will not examine the contents of the terms and conditions of carriage.
Banks will therefore reject documents which fail to comply with the requirement set out in '1' above, i.e. which fail to indicate the name of the carrier on the front of the document, even though the identify of the carrier may be indicated on the back of the document.

Although it is said in UCP Introduction that the Position Papers are no longer valid under UCP 600 the above mentioned text is an explanation of how carrier must appear and does not touch anything in UCP600.

Judith · Post by **Judith** » Thu May 28, 2009 8:52 am

Thank you for the explanation!

I didn't know that at all.

Can a Carrier Name may appear on the reverse of B/L

Can a Carrier Name may appear on the reverse of B/L

Location

not acceptable

Carrier

front and back

CARRIER,CRAZY?

On the face (To pcdognicole)

Face or front?

Cannot find "front" (To Christian)

To Judith

Dear Christian