Ocean Shipping Container Demurrage & Detention Legal Issues

In the traditional inter transport by sea,goods are usually divided into bulk cargo and general cargo.Bulk cargoes in most cases are large amounts of raw materials which need to be carried by special bulk ship.The ships carried the general cargos shall be of multilayer cabins so as to separate various goods. Carrier or his agent shall check the outer packing of goods in detail before receiving them,and ask the shipper to pack his goods on the basis of conditions for shipping stowage and safety to avoid the loss of or damage to the goods.With the development of the container transportation,now it has already replaced the general cargo transport.In the container transport,its operation service is quite different from that in the traditional transport.So,how to solve the law issues arising from the container services shall give an objective reflection to this difference.Now,the researches on the law issues in the container transport by sea are mainly divided into two aspects.One focuses on multimodal transport,emphasizing on the liability problems in it.The other focuses on law issues in the container transport,emphasizing on the new situation of such issues in container transport which have long existed in traditional transport and also ways to settle them,for example,the unknown clause in bill of lading;or emphasizing on law issues which only exist in the container transport,for example,the container demurrage.The issues on which this paper is going to discuss belong to the second direction aforesaid,namely the container demurrage.For lack of space,I will only select several subjects in hot disputes of the container demurrage.This paper consists of three parts,including introduction,text and conclusion.The introduction previews the current situation of the disputes circled about the container demurrage,and the purpose of the paper.The first chapter mainly discussed two problems.The first is the nature of container.Here on the basis of several theories on nature of container,I get my own opinion on this issue.I think a container shall be of different nature in different periods——within the liability period of carrier,a container loaded on a ship shall be seemed as one part of it,without the liability period of carrier,a container shall be seemed as a outer packing which carrier offers to the cargo owners.According to it, the container demurrage claim belongs to legal nexus of contract of carriage by sea or bill of lading.The other problem is the time bar of the container demurrage which I think shall be one year comparing to the regulations of CMC.The second chapter mainly discussed the qualified parties in the container demurrage claim.I think only the carrier himself is entitled to collect the container demurrage,and in most cases the consignee is obliged to pay it.Analyzing the special relations between bill of lading and contract of carriage by sea especially the particularity of the shipper in FOB contract,shipper can also be asked to pay the container demurrage.The third chapter mainly discussed the collection of container demurrage.That carrier is entitled to collect container demurrage is not a law regulation,but a business practice.When the container demurrage rate draw up by carrier is reasonable,it shall be valid.But if the rate is too high,and the payer of container demurrage claim to reduce,the court shall properly adjust it to a reasonable level. Then I think carrier have no right to collect the container demurrage in the case of anti-dated bill of lading.The fourth chapter I put forward some suggestions for carrier and consignee on how to collect and avoid the container demurrage.Both carrier and consignee shall have conscious to avoid the demurrage and solve the disputes arising from its occurrence as soon as possible.Last is the conclusion of this paper,I give a brief summarize to the issues discussed.