A claim, a notice, and paths short of a courtroom

The writer first sets a wider scene. Trade has long held a large place in the Korean economy, the notes say, and for a time values such as internationalization and a single global village seemed to favor more of it. Then, in this telling, a more country-centered style of trade came to the fore, with the American president Trump and the Chinese government under Xi Jinping named as figures around whom that turn gathered. Confusion and conflict in trade increased, and growth in trade slowed. Those names are kept as context for a harder climate, not as the subject of this page. In international trade, the writer says, parties often do better to settle by arbitration than by a lawsuit.

A trade claim, the notes say, is a demand that a loss in trade be put right. The injured party is the claimer, the other the claimee. Unlike a mere complaint or a quarrel, a claim is made on reasonable, logical grounds, papers, and evidence. Typical causes include quality, quantity, or packing that does not match the contract, and damage or delay in shipment. When a claimer decides to proceed, a claim notice is drawn up, with an outline of the facts, supporting papers, and a statement, set down objectively. The other side may accept, and make good the loss with damages or a replacement, or refuse, and the matter may go to a commercial arbitration body or to court. If the parties do not give up the claim or come to a compromise, a third party may be brought in: intercession, mediation, arbitration, or a lawsuit. Intercession, which the notes also write as intercession, is advice from a body with some public standing—an embassy, a commercial arbitration board, a chamber of commerce—and it has no legal force of its own, though it usually costs less. Arbitration places a third person as arbitrator, with greater power; the parties, the notes say, must obey the award.

Two drinks from Thailand, and a color that could not stay

Among cases shared by the Korea International Trade Association and by other bodies such as KOTRA, the writer turns to a quality claim. In 2018, a Korean food firm imported two kinds of drink from Thailand for the first time, and, because it was a first shipment, ordered only a small quantity. They did not agree a separate clause on quality or defects. After the drinks arrived, quarantine found in one of the two products a tar color, a synthetic coloring used to give food a particular hue, whose allowance, the notes say, depends on its type. The chemical in that product was not permitted at home, and the goods were destroyed.

The firm told the Thai exporter and claimed the cost of disposal and the price of the goods—that is, it filed a trade claim. The exporter said that the trade was on FOB terms, under which the exporter is responsible for the goods up to shipment, and that the exporter’s duty was already done. That year and those facts stay in the notes’ window.

Article 35, a piece of advice, and a contract the notes wish had been clearer

In that situation the Korean firm asked the Korea International Trade Association for advice, which the notes treat as intercession among the ways of handling a claim. Because the parties had not written a quality clause into the contract, the UN convention on contracts for the international sale of goods, as the notes name it, applied between Korea and Thailand. Under that convention, the notes say, a claim may still be valid under FOB, even without a separate quality agreement, if the product has a serious defect. The point is set out, they add, in article 35, on conformity of the goods. The association walked the importer through that article and confirmed that a claim could be made. The notes do not say how the claim was finally settled, and no ending is added here.

Two lessons, the writer says, follow. A contract that had already named defects would have made the ground of a claim clearer. Korea and Thailand both fell under the convention, so a shared rule could be used; where no such common law exists, or where legal force cannot be brought to bear on the other country, a claim may be harder. The other lesson is to use intercession and arbitration where one can. A trial against the Thai exporter, the notes say, would have meant hiring an international lawyer and preparing papers for an international suit, at great cost and time. Counsel is already offered by bodies at home, and parties do better, in this reading, to use it, to talk, and to settle at a lower cost than to go at once to court. The same Korean report, at fuller length, is on CampusDown.

Sources

1. A student report on trade claims, claim notices, and intercession, mediation, arbitration, and lawsuits, as the notes distinguish them.
2. A 2018 import of two Thai drinks, a banned tar color, an FOB defense, and article 35 of the UN convention on contracts for the international sale of goods, left in that year.
3. Advice from the Korea International Trade Association, treated in the notes as intercession; the final settlement of the claim is not recorded in the unique lines used here.

Last updated: 14 November 2026