As a trucking transportation professional, knowing pertinent regulations and laws specific to transportation not only makes your trucking company successful, but gives you additional tools to choose the most appropriate truck cargo insurance. While there are many regulations that critical to your business, the most basic, yet most important is a Bill of Lading. In addition, there are many laws that govern motor carriers. However, knowing the importance of the BMC 32 Endorsement for semi truck insurance is necessary for your success. Reliance Partners provides this information for you so that you can be better informed. We want to educate commercial trucking companies and partner with you.
The essential components to understand about a Bill of Lading include what it is, what it entails, and how it applies to motor truck cargo. A bill of lading is a type of document that is used to acknowledge the receipt of a shipment of goods. A transportation company or carrier issues this document to a shipper. In addition to acknowledging the receipt of goods, a bill of lading indicates three things:
• the particular vessel on which the goods have been placed
• their intended destination
• the terms for transporting the shipment to its final destination
The bill of lading will specify the liability of the carrier and will be obtained by a commercial insurance claims adjuster.
There are many names given to bills of lading, but the most pertinent to the commercial cargo carrier are the inland bill of lading and the through bill of lading. An inland bill of lading is a document that identifies the agreement between the shipper and the transportation company to transport its goods. This bill of lading is necessary for the domestic transportation of goods. An inland bill of lading may by negotiable or non-negotiable. When an inland bill of lading is negotiable, the person who owns the bill has certain rights. This person has the right of ownership of the goods and the right to re-route the shipment. When an inland bill of lading is non-negotiable, the carrier is required to provide delivery only to the consignee named in the document. The other type of bill of lading, the through bill of lading, covers the specific terms agreed to by a shipper and carrier. It covers the domestic and international transporting of merchandise. The through bill of lading gives the specific details about the cost to transport between specific locations.
The law that truck cargo carriers should be most familiar with is the BMC 32 Endorsement. This endorsement, which is a provision added to a carrier’s insurance contract, was created to protect shippers against unrecoverable transit losses that occur when shipping by way of motor carriers. According to William J. Augello, author of the book “Transportation, Logistics and the Law (www.transportlawtexts.com) and executive director of the Transportation Consumer Protection Council Inc. (www.tcpcinc.com), the BMC 32 is one of the most valuable protections that the Congress and the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) ever established to safeguard the shipping public. The most important features of this endorsement are:
• the cargo insurance coverage pertains to all losses or damage for which the carrier is liable up to certain limits without regard for any deductibles or exclusions that may be in the policy
• the coverage remains in effect until the insurer files a notice of cancellation or modification with the Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration
Armed with this information, you improve the efficiency and success of your trucking company.