Global Trade Review

The bureau

which conducts bills of lading checks for its members, states that while the vast majority of NVOCCs issue documents correctly, there is a small minority that do not.

According to IMB

This could lead to fraudulent practices, and banks that unwittingly process false bills of lading may find no cargo underlying the documents, or that the shipments are misrepresented.

Emergence of eBLs

The emergence of eBLs has the potential to revolutionise the international trade industry as archaic paper-based systems mean goods are often held up in ports waiting for bills of lading to verify the goods. In addition to the increased speed of document transfers, the use of a blockchain-based system is also expected to significantly reduce the risk of fraudulent bills of lading being processed.

Bill of Lading Centre Stage

Bill of lading modernisation has taken centre stage recently: earlier this year tech giant IBM partnered with Pacific International Lines (PIL), one of Southeast Asia’s largest shipping firms, to complete a real-time pilot of its electronic bill of lading (eBL) add-on for the IBM Blockchain Platform.Elsewhere, platforms like Bolero and essDocs have long been working on industry-approved eBL applications that give carriers and logistics providers the ability to create, send and manage bills of lading digitally.

Bolero partnered with Evergreen Line

Bolero recently partnered with container carrier Evergreen Line to produce a paperless bill of lading and dispatch documentation via its ShipmentLink portal. It is also looking at how to redesign its eBL service using blockchain technology, following the signing of a memorandum of understanding with fintech consortium R3 in October.

NVOCC Register

The IMB NVOCC Register, which was launched in Singapore on January 15, will include a set of anti-fraud standards for the issuance of bills of lading and aims to create a database of creditable carriers that can be referred to by a NVOCC’s counterparties.

According to IMB

Member banks may also be able to process documents of carriers on the register faster than non-members

An IMB spokesperson tells GTR

The bureau’s members are encouraging their NVOCCS to join and that it has registered more than 10 carriers so far.

The spokesperson explains

Incidents of ship-owners/carriers or their agents issuing false bills of lading are uncommon because they take a big risk in doing so and open themselves to legal action.

However

“unlike the carriers or their agents, the majority of NVOCCs do not have any assets which are at risk in these transactions, except for their reputations.”