Trade term
A delivery window, and what the law leaves open
Nothing in the carriage convention hands you a delivery window. Where no time-limit was agreed, lateness means the journey took longer than a diligent carrier would reasonably be allowed, and on a part load the time spent making up the full load counts as normal. What lateness is worth stops at the freight charge.
The figures
| When delay occurs | The goods were not delivered within the agreed time-limit, or the carriage exceeded the time it would be reasonable to allow a diligent carrier (CMR, article 19) |
|---|---|
| What counts as normal on a part load | The time required for making up a complete load in the normal way (CMR, article 19) |
| When goods count as lost | Thirty days after the agreed time-limit expires, or sixty days from take-over where none was agreed (CMR, article 20.1) |
| What delay is worth | Compensation for damage the claimant proves, not exceeding the carriage charges (CMR, article 23.5) |
| Our dispatch day and transit time | Not agreed with the grower |
What it changes on an order
You booked a slot at a distribution centre
That slot is a promise you made to your own customer. It becomes a time-limit on the road only if somebody wrote it into the carriage contract as one, and a preferred date on an order confirmation is not that.
You buy part loads rather than full trucks
Consolidation time sits inside what the convention treats as a normal duration. A window quoted on a groupage lane is describing something different from the same words quoted on a dedicated vehicle.
The carrier and the seller are different companies
A window promised by whoever sells you fruit and a time-limit agreed with whoever drives it are two separate undertakings, and the convention measures only the second. Knowing which one you were actually given is the whole difference on the morning a load runs late.
You are pricing the risk of a late arrival
The ceiling on delay under the convention is the freight, and a pallet of fruit is worth a great deal more than the freight that moved it. Anything you want protected beyond that has to live in the sales contract.
What this note does not settle
- The convention supplies a default and a ceiling. Whatever you agreed with your supplier or your carrier sits on top of it, and nothing here has read your paperwork.
- This is a description of the rules rather than legal advice, and it does not tell you whether a particular load was late or what to do about one that was.
- We have no dispatch day, no transit time and no slot to offer you. Those figures come from a packhouse and a carrier, and neither is settled.
Source: Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road (CMR)
A window is something you built
The convention never hands anyone a date. Where the parties agreed a time-limit, that is the test and there is nothing more to discuss. Where they did not, the test becomes whether the journey ran longer than would be reasonable to allow a diligent carrier, judged on the circumstances. That is a standard rather than a deadline, and it reads as though the drafting was meant that way.
Part loads get explicit treatment inside the same sentence, and it is the half most buyers skip. Time required to make up a complete load in the normal way is folded into what counts as reasonable. Groupage costs less because the vehicle waits, and the convention agrees that the waiting is normal. The same word quoted on that lane and on a dedicated truck describes two different promises.
What lateness is worth
Here the text turns blunt. Where a claimant proves damage caused by delay, the compensation does not exceed the carriage charges. Freight on a pallet of oranges is a small fraction of what the pallet is worth, so that ceiling bites long before the real loss does. Whatever you want protected above it belongs in the sales contract, agreed with whoever is selling you the fruit.
A second clock sits further out and runs longer than people expect. Goods undelivered thirty days past an agreed time-limit, or sixty days from take-over where nothing was agreed, count as lost outright. Ask us for a dispatch day and a transit time and you will get neither today, because neither has been settled with the packhouse.
Talk to the grower
Tell us the variety, the sizes and the delivery week you need. You get a delivered price and what we can commit to in writing, from the person who picks the fruit.
The grower handles enquiries. Response times are still to be confirmed.