ICE CargoDocs + Local Law
Historically, national laws did not recognize electronic Bills of Lading (eBLs), and industry worked around this with multilateral contracts creating a club of users promising each other to treat the eBL as the legal equivalent of paper. However, recently, critical jurisdictions such as the US, Singapore and the UK have introduced legislation recognizing eBLs. France, Holland, Germany, Japan and the balance of G7 nations are due to follow shortly.
Such changes to national law are a critical milestone in trade digitization, as they have the potential to greatly accelerate eBL adoption by enabling interoperability.
ICE Digital Trade can support eBLs governed by the law of any country which has enacted the Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records (MLETR) or equivalent, without the need for all participants to have signed our multilateral DSUA.
Our ICE CargoDocs Local Law eBL solution has received approval by the International Group of P&I Clubs (IG), representing the 12 Protection and Indemnity (P&I) Clubs which insure 90+% of the world’s ocean-going tonnage.
MLETR Adoption Status
The Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records (MLETR) was adopted by the United Nations in 2017. Track the current status of MLETR adoption here.
ICE CargoDocs Local Law Certifications
MLETR and most national legislation recognizing eBLs requires the system on which the eBL is created/managed to be a ‘reliable’ system.
There is no doubt that ICE CargoDocs is ‘reliable’ as it has been in use without incident across multiple market segments, covering financed and open account transactions, for 15+ years.
In addition, Holman Fenwick Willan (HFW), Rajah & Tann, and Sloma & Co have each issued an Opinion confirming that ICE CargoDocs is a reliable system for the purposes of English, Singapore, and Chinese law respectively.
We are also participating in the Digital Trust Certification Pilot Program launched by the ICC Digital Standards Initiative (DSI) to consider appropriate reliability standards for the industry. These are also a key component of interoperability and critical to accelerating adoption.
Learn More
Contact us to get started or request an online demo.