All Articles

A voyage charter gives the charterer a fixed period to load and discharge. Use less and the owner may owe despatch. Use more and the charterer owes demurrage. Between those two outcomes sits a calculation that is arithmetically simple and legally treacherous, and most disputes turn on which hours counted rather than on how the addition was done. The Laytime Definitions for Charter Parties 2013 define laytime as the period of time agreed between the parties during which the ow

Every major demurrage dispute begins somewhere. In the vast majority of voyage charter party claims, the starting point is not the cargo, not the port, and not the rate. It is a single document that determines when the laytime clock begins to run. That document is the Notice of Readiness (NOR), and its deceptively simple function, notifying the charterer that the vessel has arrived and is ready to perform, generates more litigation in the English courts and before London arbi

In normal market conditions, demurrage disputes are a routine feature of the shipping industry; frustrating, often contentious, but generally predictable in their mechanics. In a market shaped by the kind of disruption we are currently seeing in the Persian Gulf, with vessels stranded, ports congested, and voyage timelines collapsing, demurrage claims are going to multiply in volume and complexity at a rate the industry has not seen in decades. What Demurrage Actually Is Demu