Dealing with Freight Forwarders

Most of the rules governing the relationship between a freight forwarder and its customer are really unknown at the time of executing the agreement and even when the transport itself starts. In fact, both the maritime bill of lading (B/L) and the airway bill (AWB) contain clauses that the customer never gets a chance to see before its cargo is already moving.

This is easy to explain: the customer gets a copy of the B/L or AWB after having really agreed to the transportation of its cargo.

Therefore, customers normally face a certain degree of legal insecurity when dealing with freight forwarders. And in TIBA we want to solve it.

Thus, as from July 4th 2011 our customers will receive with each quotation a copy of our Standard Trading Conditions. These STC set the legal framework for the trading conditions and rules between TIBA and its customers.

What do these STC really mean for customers?

We will send each and every quotation with a second PDF file with the STC. In this way our customers will know, before they agree with us, the rules governing such agreement. If you do not receive these STC please request them form us. 

Can I stop receiving them?

Of course you can. As soon as you send us by post mail an original of the STC stamped and properly signed by an authorised signatory of your company we’ll stop sending this additional file to you.

The font is too small. Do you have a bigger font document?

Yes we do. What we send by email is small to save your bandwith. But you can download a much more confortable to read file from https://www.tibagroup.com/stc/es-en.pdf.

How do I know I received the latest version?

We’ll try to change the STC as little as possible and when we do change them, we’ll let you know.

In any case, our STC are filed in the Registro de Bienes e Inmuebles of Valencia, giving them oficial status. Likewise, both the PDF file we send with quotations and the one at https://www.tibagroup.com/stc/es-en.pdf are both digitally signed by TIBA Internacional, S.A. 

But why don’t other freight forwarders do the same?

They might be better placed to answer that :-)

But we suggest you request your freight forwarder to increase its transparency and your legal security. If they can’t do it, we do know of a great freight forwarder than can do it  :-)