Arrived Ship

What it does

The arrived ship doctrine concerns the moment at which a vessel has, in law, arrived at the contractual destination so that, once it is ready and has tendered a valid notice, laytime can begin. Whether the ship has arrived depends on the charter type: under a port charter it must have reached the port and be at the charterer's immediate and effective disposal, while under a berth charter it must usually have reached the named berth.

Arrival is one of three things that must come together before the laytime clock starts, the others being physical and legal readiness and a valid notice of readiness given in the agreed way. The doctrine matters because a notice tendered before the ship has truly arrived is open to challenge, and a successful challenge can delay the start of laytime and shift a significant sum between the parties.

Commercial effect

Because arrival is a precondition for laytime, the test for when a ship has arrived directly controls when the owner's free time ends and the charterer's exposure to demurrage begins. At a congested port, the difference between arriving on reaching the port and arriving only on reaching the berth can be days, which is exactly why the berth-or-port basis and the arrival-shifting clauses are fought over.

The doctrine also explains why owners press for WIBON, WIPON, time-lost, and reachable-on-arrival wording: each is a way of bringing forward, or working around, the moment of arrival so that waiting time counts. For the charterer, holding the line on a strict arrival test is a defence against the clock starting while the ship is merely waiting and not yet genuinely at its disposal.

Owner's perspective

The owner wants the arrival test satisfied as early as possible, so that a ready ship can tender notice and start laytime without waiting to reach a berth it cannot control. Under a port charter the owner argues for a waiting place that counts as arrival; under a berth charter it seeks whether-in-berth-or-not or similar wording to detach arrival from actually berthing.

The owner also wants certainty that, once arrived, the ship's notice cannot be undone on a technicality, which is why it pairs the arrival position with clear readiness and notice provisions. The aim is a clean, early, unchallengeable start to laytime, because every day spent arguing about whether the ship had arrived is potentially a day of demurrage at stake.

Charterer's perspective

The charterer favours a strict arrival test, so that laytime starts only when the ship has genuinely reached the agreed destination and is at the charterer's effective disposal, not while it merely waits offshore or in a queue. A tight test keeps the congestion risk where a berth charter places it and prevents the clock running before the charterer can act.

The charterer therefore resists the arrival-shifting clauses that owners propose, and where it cannot, it narrows them and insists on real readiness before any notice bites. It treats the arrival question as the front line of the laytime negotiation, because conceding an early arrival point can quietly hand the owner the congestion risk the charterer thought it had kept.

Negotiation points

• The arrival test that applies, which follows from the berth-or-port basis of the charter.
• The waiting place that counts as arrival under a port charter, and the charterer's disposal of the ship there.
• Whether arrival-shifting clauses (WIBON, WIPON, time-lost, reachable-on-arrival) move the point.
• How arrival dovetails with the readiness requirements and the notice provisions.

Common variations

• Arrival on reaching the berth, under a plain berth charter.
• Arrival on reaching the port and being at the charterer's disposal, under a port charter.
• Arrival deemed to occur at a named waiting place fixed in the charter.
• Arrival effectively advanced by whether-in-berth-or-not or whether-in-port-or-not wording.