`The fiR collditiolls do Hot hold water'
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n our view the CMR conditions do not hold water. Offshore Transport Services will no longer take on any urgent deliveries unless we have carefully discussed it with the customer first and reached a sensible agreement on time of delivery and level of payment that does not rely on CMR conditions.
We have learnt our lesson from an experience last year. OTS took on a contract, under CMR cover which cannot be waived, to carry three tonnes of ship's stores from Dagenham to a ship at the port of Algeciras in Spain. We gave a special price because we were able to part-load the vehicle with another load of freight, destined for Gibraltar. Delivery times were agreed in advance.
We decided to deliver to Algeciras first because you cannot enter Gibraltar with Spanish goods on board. But on arriving at the French-Spanish border there was a lightning strike by Spanish drivers and we could not cross for 48 hours. We were finally able to get through with a police escort and continued on our way to Algeciras to deliver the goods to the ship.
We informed our customer of the problems and were told to carry on going to Algeciras. But when we arrived at the port, the ship had sailed 36 hours before. We were then told to return the goods, still under CMR cover, back to England. We did this and then sent an invoice to the customer. Sixty days later we demanded payment and were told we would not be paid. When we took the matter to our county court the judge ruled against us saying that a strike was not a good enough reason for late delivery.
We appealed, saying that article 17 of the CMR conditions reads that you are responsible for delivering goods but cannot be responsible for war, civil strikes, and other disturbances out of your control in your own country or in others. But still we lost the appeal!
This customer could do the same thing to any other haulier. Strikes are not going to die out, in fact they are more likely to increase at borders as Customs officials start to lose their jobs in 1993. We need greater protection. y