Examples of letters

1. Buyer to foreign exporter stipulating what kind of transport and other documents are necessary. Dear Sirs,

Our Indent1 sb 55

We received your telex of the 22nd March requesting shipping instructions for our above order.

Will you please arrange for these goods to be shipped at the first opportunity from a suitable Continental Port. We require two original and two lion-negotiable Bills of Lading² which should be taken out in our name as shippers and consigned to «Order»⁸ the ultimate consignees being⁴ Messrs. Wodehouse Co. Ltd., Accra.

When Bills of Lading become available, these should be forwarded to us in London together with 4 copies of

your certified invoice and your draft through the Bank⁵; of British West Africa, 37, Gracechurch St., London Ev С 4. Freight charges incurred should be shown on invoices j and included in your draft⁶.

We trust that this information will be of assistance to you.

Yours faithfully,

2. Agent advising shipper about trasport and other documents necessary for export delivery. Diar Sirs, Universal Rapid Electro Hygrometer⁷ for Textiles

Further to our letter of the 8th March, we now have the pleasure to inform you that Messrs. Populas confirmed with us their order for the Hygrometer quoted in your Proforma Invoice of March 16,... .Also we have obtained Import Licence No. 87531 of March 30, .... for the above order ough^Jie; BBof Greece,At ens Please note that, after the order has been shipped, the following documents will have to be sent for collection to the Bank of Greece⁸, Athens, under their reference No. 03534:

a) complete set «On Board Bills of Lading», issued unto «Order»⁹,

b) Invoice in eight copies,

c) Certificate of Origin in duplicate,

d) Copy of the Insurance Policy on the full invoice value plus ten per cent.

Though the import licence is valid up to the 30th September..., we trust that nevertheless you will stick to the delivery time specified in your proforma invoice, i.e. one month alter the receipt of the order.

We now look forward to receiving your Order Confirmation.

Yours faithfully,

3. Continuation of the above. The Agent to the Shipper.

Dear Sirs. One Hygrometer — Order Confirmation No. 25 611

We thank you very much for your Order Confirmation No. 25 611 which has been duly passed on to Messrs. Populos of this place.

Yours faithfully,

4. Continuation of the above. Tlie Agent to the Shipper. Dear Sirs,

One Hygrometer for Messrs. Populos Messrs. РорШб'ШГ jusl^f4nMrmW MW&i their bankers, the Bank of Greece, Athens, received the shipping documents for the above order. Unfortunately they are accompanied by one copy, only, of the final invoice instead of the eight copies required. Furthermore the documents are short of¹⁰ Certificate of Origin in duplicate. In our letter of March 26,..., the 'receipt of which you acknowledged with your letter of April 8,..., we informed you which documents would have to be sent in order to avoide complications at this end¹¹.

We therefore request you to examine whether the required Certificate of Origin and the Invoice copies have been sent under separate cover¹². Otherwise, please send them to our address as soon as possible. Another point which we should like to draw your kind attention to is this: on the invoice which you sent to the Bank of Greece, only the total value of USD 1850.00 is stated. In fact also! our commission of USD 185.00 should be shown. Please,! be so kind as to put in the amount of our commission on the additional copies of the invoice you will send us, and deduct it from the total CIF value¹³ exactly as on your proforma invoice of March 16,... .

Yours faithfully,

5. Continuation of the Above. The Agent to the Shipper. .

Dear Sirs,

Hygrometer Documents in Order

We are much obliged for your letter of 17^th May, . and apologize for not having replied any sooner.

We are sorry for the inconvenience we caused you with our letter of 10^th May .... However, we simply passed on the news we had received from the custdftflrslira-lUieir bankers. On receipt of your above letter we ascertained that actually a clerk of the bank mistook the Advice of Despatch for the shipping documents¹⁴.

In any case the actual shipping documents were duly received in the meantime and the customers paid the value of the order to their bankers. Furthermore they took delivery of the Hygrometer yesterday. We visited them to hand over the translation of the operation manual¹⁵, and helped them to start work with the instrument.

The directions for measuring the moisture contents of bobbins are very clear¹⁸. Unfortunately, however, we arc hot sure of the correct measuring process when the gauge bobbin is to be used, the material being wool¹⁷.

Would you, please, send us the necessary technical advice?

We should be glad to hear from you soon.

Yours faithfully,

6. Carrier requesting agent to issue and sing on his behalf amended Bils of Lading. Dear Sirs,

Re: m.v. Pioner Vyborga, Sailed from¹⁸ St. Petersburg Oct. 12,...

Please issue and sign on our behalf¹⁹ B/Ls with the following amentments²⁰:

B/L VGA 301

The total number of cars shipped should be 303 unpackages²¹ instead of -340; VAZ-2108 - should be 80 unpackages 80000 kgs. (instead of 90); VAZ-2109 — should be 43 unpackages, 43 000 kgs (instead of 70).

ЕСЗО£

The total number of empty containers²² shipped per this B/L should be 83.

B/L С 315

Please introduce the following corrections into Container Nos and Seals²³:

SZDV3 458 049, Seal No: B-89364

MMMV8 960 022, Seal No: B-89365

MMMV3 141 492, Seal No: VAZ-216

Many thanks in advance and best regards.

Faithfully yours,

7. For the Attention of. The BBC Commercial Director, Manager of the Cargo Documentation Department²⁴, Manager of the B/L Department of the St Petersburg Port. Dear Sirs,

Re: New Regulations Concerning Documents for the Port of Brazil

In line with the new port legislation²⁵ which is being introduced now in Brazil and is going to come into force, beginning with September 1 ..., we would like to inform you of the following new rules²⁶ concerning cargo documentation of all ships calling in the ports²⁷ of Brazil.

1. The B/L Numeration.

The numbers of all B/Ls should now consist of five digits²⁸, the first digit showing the type of cargo, i.e. 50 000 — autotechnique, 30 000 — normal cargo in containers, 70 000 — consolidated cargo in containers²⁹.

20 000— dangerous cargo* in, containers or otherwise³⁰.

The numeration of the B/Ls should not necessarily

be through³¹ from the first to the last B/L for the same port. This is the matter to be decided by yourselves, and you may well continue the old practice of introducing the new count of B/L's for each type of cargo³², e.g. 50 001, 50 002, etc., then 30 001, 30 002, etc. This will not hamper³³ the work of the new National Computer Cargo System which is being introduced in all ports of Brazil. .However, it would be convenient for us and indeed speed up the handling of the vessels³⁴, if you would have the Reference Numbers which do not repeat themselves. Some instances of this (although rarely) have occurred in the past, and we would be much obliged if you would take up this question with³⁵ that department which gives numbers to the Shippers' notes and settle the matter with them. We believe that this is to your convenience as well.