Carriage Contracts Concluded through Representatives and Freight Brokerage

In international transport, contracts of carriage are often concluded not by the parties themselves but through representatives and brokers. Our Turkish article examines the legal questions this raises.

The first part covers representation: direct and indirect representation, the scope of authority, the internal and external relationships, and the conflict of laws rules under Turkish private international law that determine which law governs the relationship between the principal, the representative and third parties, including cases of unauthorised representation.

The second part focuses on freight brokerage. It discusses the relationship between brokerage and mandate, the law applicable to brokerage contracts, brokerage in carriage by sea, air and road, and how brokers differ from other independent commercial intermediaries such as agents and freight forwarders.

Since the role of a broker or representative determines who is liable when something goes wrong in transit, it is important to define that role clearly in the contract.

This is a short English summary of our article published in Turkish.