A Study On The Protection Of The Rights And Interests Of Recipient In China 's Courier Service Contract

With the rapid development of e-commerce, the number of consumers shopping online has been increasing. The express delivery service industry has become an indispensable part of our lives. Due to the lack of specific legislative regulations governing China’s express delivery service industry, the inherent problems of express delivery service enterprises and the weakness of the legal awareness and interest awareness of the recipients, the legitimate rights and interests of the recipients are often infringed.The express delivery service contract is a typical freight contract and contract involving third parties. Since the recipient is not a party to such contract, it is difficult to confirm their rights and obligations, whereby their personal rights and property rights are often compromised. By demonstrating the rights and interests of the recipients, this thesis analyzes the legal status of recipients in the delivery service contract, determines their rights to request immediate payment, to take delivery upon payment, as well as their request for the creditor protection against the debtor, namely the express delivery service enterprises, and analyzes the various types of damages of recipient’s interests based on specific cases. The thesis focuses on analyzing the problem of damages to the recipient’s interests, mainly reflected at the stage of the conclusion of the contract, namely, the standard terms under the express delivery service contract provided by the express delivery service enterprises contain contents that lead to damages to the recipient’s rights, such as the price insurance clause, the exemption clause, and the clause regarding limitation to the claim period, etc. The express delivery enterprises do not fulfill their obligations of reminding, instructions and inspection, resulting in the instability of the safety and completeness of the goods delivered. At the stage of implementation of the contract, the express delivery service enterprises conduct violence sorting, loading and other acts, failing to properly fulfill their obligations of transportation and storage; and avoid responsibilities or refuse to compensate at the indemnification stage, and even if some are willing to compensate, the indemnification is only on the basis of the terms of the amount insured, rather than ensuring the legitimate rights and interests of the recipients.By drawing on the legislative systems in the civil law and common law countries on the protection of the legitimate rights and interests of the recipients, this thesisexplores and analyzes the legal norms for China’s express delivery service industry and provides suggestions with respect to the issues in the express delivery businesses: at the stage of conclusion of the contract, requiring the express delivery service enterprises to develop standard terms in accordance with the principles of good faith and fair allocation of responsibilities between the parties; actively fulfilling their obligations to ensure the safety and completeness of the goods delivered; and actively implement the real-name registration system and the proper protection of the personal information of the parties; at the stage of the performance of the contract, requiring the express delivery service enterprises to supervise the contract performance, punishing the acts of violence sorting, etc; and establishing the regime of receipt after inspection, namely to confirm receipt of the shipment after inspection to avoid the difficulties of burden of proof when the recipient’s right is infringed; at the stage of indemnification, requiring the express delivery service enterprises to actively compensate and to ensure that the recipient’s actual damages are compensated; in addition, to have the shipment of goods with higher value insured in order to reduce the risk of the express delivery service enterprises. The above suggestions aim to reduce the damages to the personal and property rights suffered by the recipients and effectively protect their legitimate rights and interests.