Interest on delayed payment / General principles and normal usages of international trade / Rate of reference / Starting point

In an interim award, the arbitrator decided that no specific national legislation was applicable to the present case and that it was therefore to be settled in accordance with the general principles of law and the established usages of international trade.

'Whereas the Claimant requests that the British parties be sentenced to pay legal interest from the date of maturity to the date of payment;

Whereas on the one hand, according to commercial usage, the debtor must compensate the creditor for the delay in fulfilling his obligation to pay a sum of money;

Whereas, on the other hand, the fact that it is a French party that suffered in France the loss to be compensated by the interest payment must be taken into account in awarding the indemnity;

Consequently such interest is to be computed at the French legal rates applicable in turn: at 9.50% until 14 July 1989; 7.82% from 15 July 1989 until 31 December 1989; and 9.36% until full payment, subject to any further changes in the French legal rates;

Lastly, it is also in accordance with commercial usage to let interest run from the date of the formal claim, in the present case from the Request for Arbitration.'