ICC Digital Library Forum

Credit issued by a foreign bank required among others the following docs:-

1.Fumigation certificate in duplicate issued by laboratory acceptable to the AQIS
2.Packing declaration in duplicate according to AQIS Standards
3.Inspection certificate issued & signed by the authorised signatory of applicant whose signature must be in conformity with the record held in the issuing bank's file.
4.Shipping Co's certificate certifying that the vessel is a classified regular liner vessel.

We do not know what AQIS stand for, let alone AQIS Standards….we suspect it must be an association of some sort.
What do they mean by classified regular liner vessel?
Yr comments would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

1. Fumigation Cert. - There is no need to know what AQIS stands for. If the document presented states that it is issued by a laboratory acceptable to the AQIS, it complies with the credit term.
2. Similarly if the packing declaration states that it is issued according to AQIS standards, it complies.
4. If the shipping company's certificate states what is required, this will comply. This is another example of a bank using four words where two are required. The words classified and regular are superfluous. A liner vessel, by definition, serves a regular rota of ports. This is not a full definition, but it will serve for the purposes here.

Laurence A. J. Bacon

We would like to give a few comments here as a columnist of the Lloyd's maritime magazine whilst we were in Hong Kong (1993-95):

1 As Mr. Bacon said, a document examiner is only required to check the documents "on their face" and it is not necessary for him to verify the contents of the documents. If the documents say what the LC requires, that is it. However, understanding what AQIS is is a good idea to avoid risk and this information can easily be obtained from the applicant or the end user.

2 "Classified and regular" used in the context with "liner vessel" are not only superfluous, as commented by Mr. Bacon, but also they are giving "excessive details", against UCP 500 sub Article 5 (a) (i).

3 In fact "classified regular liner vessel" is a layman term. The shipping industry never uses such description to rate a cargo ship. Cargo ships are required to perform periodical checking to ensure that they are seaworthy and cargoworthy.

4 This checking is done by the classification societies, such as Lloyd's Registry of Shipping (UK), Bureau Veritas (France), Germanischer Lloyd (Germany), Registro Italiano (Italy), Nippon Kaiji Kyokai (Japan), Det Norske Veritas (Norway), American Bureau of Shipping (USA) and other members of the IACS (International Association of Classification Societies).

5 If the ship has passed the tests, many certificates will be issued, such as Certificate of Class, Cargo Ship Safety Radio Certificate, Cargo Ship Safety Equipment Certificate, Cargo Ship Safety Construction Certificate, International Load Line Certificate, International Oil Pollution Prevention Certificate, Excemption Certificate, so on and so forth.

6 There is no such certificate called "Classified Regular Liner Vessel Certificate". For simplicity the LC should have asked for certification of "100 AI at Lloyd's" which is the top-class rating, that would reduce the hull insurance premium of that chartered cargo ship.

7 Before a cargo ship is permitted to sail out of a seaport, these certificates must be submitted to the port authority for checking on sufficiency (not a single certificate is missing) and validity (not expired). These certificates work like a "passport" or "health certificate" of a cargo ship.

8 If the applicant or the issuing bank wish to ensure that the cargo ship is seaworthy and cargoworthy, they should get themselves familiarised with the classification practice first before they put any such requirements in the LC. If they have no time to do so, we are very glad to provide help.

We are from www.tolee.com

[edited 2/26/02 8:04:03 PM]