In London Arbitration 22/17 charterers claimed that owners’ demurrage claim was barred by reason of the following clause in the charter: “Charterers shall be discharged and release [sic] from all liability in respect of any claims under this Charter unless such claim has been presented to Charterers in writing with supporting documents within 30 days from completion of discharge.”
Charterers argued that the clause required that there had to be simultaneous presentation with the 30 days of the written demurrage claim, together with the supporting documentation. The two notices of readiness had not been submitted with the written claim, although copies had been supplied before the cut-off period, and they had been supplied contemporaneously with the events to which they related.
The tribunal rejected charterer’s contention. The owners had provided enough documentation for charterers to evaluate the demurrage claim. The documentation had to be provided within the deadline but did not need to be provided simultaneously with the claim. Accordingly, owners’ demurrage claim was not time barred.
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Professor Simon Baughen
Professor Simon Baughen was appointed as Professor of Shipping Law in September 2013 (previously Reader at the University of Bristol Law School). Simon Baughen studied law at Oxford and practised in maritime law for several years before joining academia. His research interests lie mainly in the field of shipping law, but also include the law of trusts and the environmental law implications of the activities of multinational corporations in the developing world. Simon's book on Shipping Law, has run to seven editions (soon to be eight) and is already well-known to academics and students alike as by far the most learned and approachable work on the subject. Furthermore, he is now the author of the very well-established practitioner's work Summerskill on Laytime. He has an extensive list of publications to his name, including International Trade and the Protection of the Environment, and Human Rights and Corporate Wrongs - Closing the Governance Gap. He has also written and taught extensively on commercial law, trusts and environmental law. Simon is a member of the Institute of International Shipping and Trade Law, a University Research Centre within the School of Law, and he currently teaches at Swansea on the LLM in:Carriage of Goods by Sea, Land and Air; Charterparties Law and Practice; International Corporate Governance.
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