Attorney Gil Nadel, Lior Manshrof
The Magistrate's Court of Ashdod has recently deferred the legal action filed by a ground carrier (a truck company) against a Customs agent. The court ruled that the ground carrier was unable to prove that the conveyance was ordered by the Customs agent.
The Customs agent's claim, that the transportation services were ordered by a customer and not by the agent, was sustained by the court.
The case and the claims made by the parties
The ground carrier claimed that in late 2008 the Customs agent requested a transport of three containers to one of his customers, for export to Cyprus.
The ground carrier claimed that after the shipment reached its destination he produced an invoice for the sum of approximately NIS 5,000, but the Customs agent refused to pay because he claimed the end client (the beneficiary of the shipment) did not pay him.
The Customs agent, on the other hand, claimed he had not requested any transportation services from the ground carrier. He claimed to have provided his client with shipment and Customs brokering services, and the client was the one who ordered the transportation services from the ground carrier. In support of this claim, the Customs agent noted that he customarily uses the transportation services of other companies that provide services at lower rates than those of the prosecuting company in question.
The court's ruling:
The court was asked to determine the following question: who ordered the transportation services from the land transporter? Was it the Customs agent or the end client who was the beneficiary of this transportation service?
For lack of a written agreement between the parties, the court ruled that the plaintiff- the ground carrier- is accountable for providing proof that the services were ordered by the Customs agent as he claims.
Towards this end, the ground carrier provided documents which he believes are proof that the parties had come to an agreement regarding the provision of transportation services and that the client was not involved in reaching this agreement.
After perusing these documents the court found that the bill of lading and the consignment note produced by the ground carrier were not made out to the end client and not the Customs agent. The Customs agent's name only appeared on the delivery note as the recipient.
Furthermore, the court noted that the ground carrier provided only one witness and that it is impossible to base the prosecution on only one witness in the absence of further support.
Therefore, the court reached the conclusion that the ground carrier failed to prove his claim that the agreement was made between himself and the Customs agent since the documents procured by him refute this claim.
In the end the court deferred the ground carrier's prosecution and charged him with the payment of expenses and the professional services fee at a sum total of NIS 3,000.
[Swift Procedure Civil Suite (Magistrate's Court Ashdod) 15080-02-11 RMPH Transportation Services Ltd. vs Kislev Transport and Trade Ltd., verdict of May 7, 2012, Judge Ariel Bergner, party representatives were not mentioned].
Notes:
In this case the land transporter's prosecution of the Customs agent failed due to the absence of a written agreement between the parties. We believe it would have wise for the land transporter to include the beneficiary of the shipment in this action and in so doing the court would have been required to determine who should be held accountable for the shipment fee.
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