Debt recovery ocean shipping claims usually reach us after a carrier, forwarder or charterer has performed the carriage and issued the invoice, yet the counterparty has stopped paying freight, demurrage or a general average contribution. This page sets out the debt profile we see, the documents that decide the claim, and the route we take once the file has been assessed.
Most files on our desk are unpaid freight invoices, outstanding demurrage or detention, disputed container deposit charges, or a general average contribution that a cargo interest refuses to pay. The debtor is sometimes the shipper, sometimes the consignee, sometimes a forwarder or NVOCC sitting between the two. In a smaller number of files the counterparty is a charterer who has taken delivery and then stopped answering.
The common feature is that the cargo has moved and the commercial relationship has effectively ended before the invoice is settled. That timing matters. Once the vessel has sailed and the goods have been discharged, the creditor loses much of its practical leverage and is left with a paper claim against a counterparty that may be based in another country entirely.
Carriage claims are decided on paper before they are decided on argument. The file we ask for at intake typically includes:
A clean, consistent documentary trail is worth more to a carrier's claim than a strong argument on the underlying contract. Gaps in that trail are the first thing a debtor's lawyer will exploit.
The most common defence is a cargo damage or short delivery counterclaim, raised to offset the freight or demurrage owed. Others include a disputed demurrage calculation, an argument that port congestion or force majeure suspended running time, or a claim that the bill of lading was issued to the wrong party. A jurisdiction or arbitration clause buried in the charterparty is often raised late, once the merits look weak.
Most of these defences fail against a clean bill of lading, a notice of readiness that was accepted without qualification, and correspondence showing no protest was raised at the time. A debtor who stayed silent for months rarely has a credible late objection, and that silence becomes part of the evidence.
We assess the file first: the documents, the counterparty's known assets, and whether the contract points to court or to arbitration. Many charterparties and bills of lading route disputes to arbitration, sometimes under rules that also govern general average adjustment under the York-Antwerp Rules. Cargo liability itself is frequently framed by the Hague-Visby Rules or, in some trades, the Hamburg Rules or the Rotterdam Rules.
Once the forum is settled, a formal demand under the contract's notice provisions usually opens the file, followed by negotiation on the documentary record. Where negotiation fails, the route runs either to court or to the agreed arbitral tribunal. An arbitral award is generally enforceable abroad under the New York Convention 1958; a court judgment from within the European Union benefits from the recognition mechanism in Regulation (EU) 1215/2012. Outside that framework, enforcement runs through the local court where the debtor holds assets, and we confirm that route before advising on it.
We say so at intake rather than after fees have accrued.
Sometimes. A well-documented demurrage claim often settles on correspondence alone, without a formal reference to arbitration. Where the charterparty routes disputes to arbitration and the counterparty will not pay on demand, that clause becomes the forum we use.
We review who actually contracted for the carriage and who took delivery of the cargo, since the named shipper on the bill is not always the party liable for freight. The booking confirmation and the correspondence around it usually resolve the question.
Yes. Forwarders and NVOCCs sit contractually between the cargo interest and the carrier, and they are frequently the counterparty that has actually stopped paying. The route depends on which contract binds them and where they hold assets.
A vessel that has already sailed and a charterer who has stopped answering leave little time before the practical leverage disappears entirely. The longer an unpaid freight or demurrage file sits without a documented demand, the harder it becomes to show the counterparty was on notice. For a shipper, forwarder or carrier watching an invoice age past the point where the cargo can still be leveraged, the question is no longer whether to act but which forum still offers a realistic path to payment.