WHETHER A BILL OF LADING IS DISCREPANT IF IT DOES NOT CONTAIN A DATE OF ISSUANCE

Fishing early morning on Han River

QUESTION

Dear Mr. Old Man,

Long time to see you !

Please help me to solve the problem relating to issuing date of B/L.

The B/L presented without showing issuing date but mentioned clearly date of loading on board. Is it discrepant ?

Please  note that the L/C not required showing date on shipping documents or other documents.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Thanks and best regards

TB

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ANSWER

Hi,

As I do not see the bill of lading, my answer is YES and NO.

Why YES?

It is a discrepancy if the bill of lading contains a field for place and/or date of issue but it is not completed.

Why NO?

It is not a discrepancy if the bill of lading is issued in the format where there is no field for place and/or date of issue.

Please note that the structure of a transport document is not governed by UCP 600.

My answer is based on Official Opinion R659 / TA634rev, the conclusion of which is quoted as below:

QUOTE

It should be noted from the text of the query under ICC Opinion R. 285 that the question as to whether or not a transport document, in that case a non-negotiable sea waybill or multimodal transport document, should indicate two dates – one for the date of issuance and one for the on board date – was posed by a transport (shipping) company. This was probably based on the manner in which their transport documents were issued. This query is also based on the manner in which a bill of lading has been issued by a shipping company.

From the example of the bill of lading presented under this request for Opinion, there is no field for a place and/or date of issue. There is only a field labeled “Shipped on Board Date”. The structure of a transport document is not governed by the UCP; this is for each shipping company or agent to determine. From the details relating to this particular bill of lading, there is no requirement for a date of issuance; therefore, completion of the shipped on board date serves two purposes: (1) the date of issuance of the document and (2) the date that the goods were shipped on board.

A document issued in the format provided is not discrepant if it does not contain a date of issuance. The shipped on board date would constitute the date of the bill of lading for the purpose of ISBP publication 681 paragraph 13.

UNQUOTE

Kind regards,

Mr. Old Man