BILL OF LADING

Types of Bill of Lading

Introduction

There is an enormous variety in bills of lading. It is consequently useful to draw up a list as complete as possible of the bills of lading which one can come across. Often there is confusion with the name which is given to the various bills of lading. Often the same bill of lading bears a different name or, the same name is given to different bills of lading. It is as a consequence necessary to be very cautious during negotiations and to make sure that the parties concerned speak about the same document. The type of bill of lading used is mainly characterized by the traffic and the type of goods being carried.

The bill of lading forms are produced by different bodies such as: BIMCO, shipping companies, shippers, charterers, freight forwarders, etc. Most bills of lading receive a "Code Name"

Following bills of lading can be encountered:

-The direct bill of lading or port to port bill of lading;
-The long-form bill of lading;
-The short-form bill of lading;
-The blank back bill of lading;
-The multimodal transport bill of lading;
-The Through bill of lading
-The combined transport bill of lading;
-The clean bill of lading and foul bill of lading;
-The received for shipment bill of lading;
-The shipped bill of lading;
-The bill of lading for container transport;
-The negotiable/not negotiable bill of lading;
-The Sea Waybill;
-The conline booking.

Often the face of the bill of lading shows the mention: "Marine Bill of lading" or "Ocean Bill of Lading". This is a bill of lading only used for carrying goods by ship, in other words, a "port to port bill of lading".

Sometimes the terms "Conventional Bill of Lading" or "Break-bulk Bill of Lading" is used. These bills of lading are solely used for carriage at sea of conventional goods with the exclusion of containers, in other words, in the liner shipping as it existed before containerisation.

Some bills of lading like the CONBILL and the VISCONBILL have become obsolete and are consequently not used anymore. They have of course been replaced by other similar bills of lading.

Remark

For a complete list of documents available, see http://www.bimco.dk/Corporate%20Area/idea/List%20of%20documents.aspx

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