The Client, the forwarding company, referred to CPS Attorneys due to protection of his interests in a commercial dispute with the Ukrainian seaport about recovering debts for the port’s storage and transshipment services.

The port demanded payment for the storage of goods for the period when the cargo was confiscated by the bodies of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine by the order of General prosecutor’s office of Ukraine and recognized as material evidence in the criminal proceedings. Subsequently, the cargo was arrested by the decision of the investigating judge and passed to the port for safekeeping.

CPS Attorneys specialists referred to the absence of fault of the forwarding company in the arrest of the goods in accordance with Article 614 of the Civil Code of Ukraine, as well as referred to the provisions of the current legislation of Ukraine regarding the procedure for compensation of costs for storage of material evidence by the state.

Separate attention should be paid on the demand of the port for calculating rates for the rendered services. After acceptance of the cargo for storage and its transshipment, the port decided to change the essential terms of the storage contract, namely – to establish new rates for storage and transshipment of cargo. Further the port attempted to apply new rates to the storage and transshipment of the Client’s cargo, received and processed in the port before applying of new rates. CPS Attorneys lawyers objected the satisfaction of such claims, taking into account their obvious groundlessness.

As a result, the Appeal Commercial court agreed with the arguments of CPS Attorneys specialists, refused to satisfy the appeal of the seaport in full and left the decision of the first instance court in force.

The interests of the Client in this case were defended by lawyer Sergey Kotyukh and attorney-at-law Sergey Sushko.