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Which information on missing goods in freight wagons should be legally provided?
Article 42 § 1 CIM requires the carrier to draw-up a formal report in case of partial loss or damage of the goods in every case where partial loss or damage is discovered or presumed by the carrier or alleged by the person entitled from the contract of carriage.
The content of this formal report is not specified under CIM UR but is a subject to free consideration of evidence and facts. For this purpose, the CIT draw-up a standardise form of the formal report CIT20 and since 1st of July 2021 also an electronic formal report CIT20a for his members. In this context the question for the application of the CIT Freight Documentation and especially based on the CIT Freight Traffic Manual (GTM-CIT) the distinction between the applicable formal report in the shape of CIT20 and the missing goods report in CIT21 is important.
The purpose of the CIT20 GTM-CIT is to record the condition of the goods and the significance of loss or damage in the event of transport damage. It must be established in the event of partial loss or damage to the goods. In the event of total loss, a formal report can be also drawn-up, but at the earliest 30 days after the expiry of the transit period. For further information Worksheet 06-01 in GTM-CIT is applicable and on the concept of loss of the goods Article 29 § 1 CIM.
The purpose of the CIT21 GTM-CIT on the other side is to search for missing goods. It must be established as soon as it is noted that the goods are completely missing or that one or more packages of the same shipment are missing. The CIT21 must therefore also be established in the event of a missing wagon in a block train or group of wagons consigned with a single consignment note as indicated in CIT23 GTM-CIT. For this purpose, the Worksheet 07-01 of GTM-CIT is applicable.
On this way the two forms of the CIT Freight Documentation are complementary, as they have different purposes during the international carriage of goods by rail under Article 1 § 1 CIM.
Article 29 § 1: “The person entitled may, without being required to furnish further proof, consider the goods as lost when they have not been delivered to the consignee or placed at his disposal within thirty days after the expiry of the transit periods.”