Fax and Carriers: Delivery Reservations and Disputes

Short answer: in freight transport, what loses a dispute is almost never the reality of the damage — it is the absence of written reservations within the deadline. Article L. 133-3 of the French Commercial Code is brutal: taking delivery of transported goods extinguishes any action against the carrier for damage or partial loss, unless, within three days (excluding public holidays) following receipt, the consignee has notified the carrier of a reasoned complaint by extrajudicial instrument or by registered letter. Fax serves four very specific purposes within this timetable. Sending the reasoned complaint on a Friday evening or a Saturday, when the post office is closed and the third day falls on Monday. Confirming in writing reservations handwritten on the delivery note, which are often illegible or disputed. Urgently forwarding case documents — photos, annotated delivery note, purchase invoice, expert report — to the carrier's claims department or to the cargo insurer. And serving a formal demand before the one-year limitation period expires. For everything else, the file lives on through email to the claims department, the carrier's customer portal and registered letters. A rule to carve in stone: fax proves that you complained in time and with which words; it proves neither the actual condition of the goods nor the amount of your loss.

Why reservations are the real risk, not the damage

A business owner who receives a split pallet thinks about the goods. The judge, on the other hand, will look first at the delivery note and the date of the letter of complaint.

The mechanism at work is the presumption of conforming delivery. By signing the transport document without reservation, the consignee acknowledges having received the goods in the condition described. The carrier is then presumed to have properly performed its obligation. Reversing that presumption requires two cumulative conditions, and both are easily missed.

First condition: precise reservations. "Subject to unpacking", "parcel damaged", "subject to verification": commercial case law has long regarded such wording as ineffective, because it describes nothing. A useful reservation names the parcel concerned, the nature of the damage and its extent: "parcel 3 of 5, box crushed on the top face, one ceramic vase broken, two scratched".

Second condition: a reasoned complaint within the deadline. Even with reservations on the note, Article L. 133-3 requires, for domestic transport, written notification to the carrier within three days excluding public holidays following receipt. Handwritten reservations are not enough on their own: they must be confirmed. That is precisely where cases die.

Three pitfalls hide within this framework.

The first: the deadline runs from receipt, not from discovery. A company that takes delivery on Friday and opens the boxes on Monday morning has already used up its useful window.

The second: the driver is not a valid recipient of notification. Handing them an annotated copy is not the same as notifying the carrier. The complaint must go to the head office or the claims department of the transport company.

The third: the limitation period is short. Under domestic law as well as under the CMR (Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road), the action is in principle time-barred after one year, extended to three years in cases of wilful misconduct or equivalent fault under the CMR.

The four uses of fax in a transport dispute

1. The reasoned complaint sent outside business hours

This is the textbook case. Delivery on Wednesday, unpacking on Thursday, damage observed. The third non-holiday day falls on Saturday, when no registered letter goes out. A fax sent on Friday evening at 9 p.m. produces a timestamped transmission report showing the number dialled, the date, the time, the number of pages and the outcome.

That report is not proof of content in the sense of an authenticated instrument, but it establishes a fact that is hard to dispute: a document of so many pages was transmitted to this number, on this date. Combined with a copy of the page sent, it forms prima facie evidence that courts weigh freely, in line with the logic of Article 1366 of the Civil Code on electronic writings.

In practice, the winning sequence is twofold: immediate fax to stop the clock, then registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt posted on Monday with the same letter, stating "confirmation of our complaint sent by fax on Friday 2 October at 9:04 p.m.".

2. Confirming illegible handwritten reservations

Reservations handwritten on a courier's touchscreen terminal are often reduced to a signature and a ticked box. Reservations written in pen on a crumpled note are sometimes indecipherable. In both cases, the carrier's objection is predictable: "general reservations, therefore ineffective".

The answer is to rewrite the reservations cleanly in a typed letter, attach a photocopy of the annotated note, and send the whole set. Receiving departments equipped with a portable document scanner can produce a clean, legible bundle in three minutes, usable by a judge three years later.

3. Forwarding documents to a claims department or an expert

Carriers and freight forwarders frequently appoint an amicable expert. That expert requests documents on short notice: delivery note, consignment note or CMR, commercial invoice, photos, packing list, sometimes the packer's certificate.

Fax has an operational advantage here: it arrives on a number dedicated to the claims department, often monitored, without passing through a spam filter or a saturated generic mailbox. For bulky files, good practice is to send a summary cover page by fax and the full file by secure electronic means. We go into these trade-offs in our comparison of fax or secure messaging.

4. The formal demand before the limitation period expires

A case that drags on for eleven months is a lost case. Fax makes it possible to send a formal demand for payment timestamped the same day, before launching proceedings. The same reflex applies to breaking off a negotiation that is dragging on endlessly: a dated written record is worth more than a phone conversation.

Table of deadlines to know

This table is not legal advice: the standard contracts of the Transport Code, the carrier's general terms and conditions and, for international shipments, the applicable conventions (CMR for road, Montreal for air, Rotterdam Rules or Hague-Visby Rules for sea) modify these rules. Always check the consignment note. Reference works on transport law, updated each year, remain the most reliable tool for settling a borderline case.

What a reasoned complaint must contain

A good complaint fits on one page and answers six questions.

1. Who is writing: company name, company registration number, address, name and position of the signatory.
2. Which shipment: consignment note or CMR number, tracking number, name of the carrier and of any subcontractor, date and time of delivery, place.
3. Which goods: description, number of parcels announced, number received, weight, declared value.
4. What damage: description parcel by parcel, nature of the damage, estimated extent, photos referenced in an annex.
5. What legal characterisation: damage, partial loss, total loss, delay — the legal regime is not the same.
6. What claim: express reservation of all rights, request for a joint expert assessment, provisional estimate of the loss, mention of confirmation by registered letter.

Avoid three formulations that weaken a case: "subject to unpacking", "we reserve the right to…" without quantifying anything, and "your driver acknowledged that…" without anything in writing from the driver.

Building the evidence file in parallel

Fax proves the date of the complaint. It proves nothing about the condition of the goods. That work is done at receipt, in the minutes following the lowering of the tail lift.

Photograph before unpacking. Wrapped pallet, strapping, labels, shock indicators. Then each parcel, then the contents. With the camera's automatic timestamp switched on. Photos taken with a phone are enough in most cases; for regular flows of fragile goods, adhesive shock indicators stuck on the parcels at dispatch turn an argument into an established fact.

Weigh and measure. A discrepancy in weight between the consignment note and the goods received is strong evidence of partial loss. Platforms that handle frequent deliveries keep an industrial parcel scale near the dock for that very reason.

Keep the packaging. A carrier very often disputes the adequacy of the packaging, which is a ground for exemption from liability. A box destroyed and thrown away makes the debate impossible. Keep everything until the dispute is closed.

Document the cold chain, where applicable. For temperature-controlled products, the data log counts as much as the photo. A USB temperature logger placed in the parcel at dispatch provides a usable curve, far more convincing than a note saying "product lukewarm on arrival".

Archive properly. Fax transmission receipt, copy of the pages sent, acknowledgement of receipt of the registered letter, photos, delivery notes: one file per dispute, named by consignment note number, kept for at least three years. See our method in digitising your paper documents without losing their validity.

The limits you need to know

Let us be clear about what fax does not do.

It does not replace the extrajudicial instrument or the registered letter required by Article L. 133-3. It constitutes free-form evidence, assessed at the sole discretion of the trial judge. A carrier acting in bad faith will deny having received the document: your only counterweight is the transmission report, plus the postal confirmation.

It does not create any new right. If there were no initial reservations and you discover the damage after eight days in domestic transport, foreclosure has set in and no transmission will change that.

It is not suited to bulky or colour documents. A twelve-page invoice, an expert report, a photo portfolio come out poorly in black and white at 200 dpi. Fax the letter, send the annexes another way.

Finally, check the number. Carriers regularly shut down their fax lines. A wrong number produces a failure report, not evidence. Our service only sends to French numbers: for a carrier that can only be reached abroad, use another channel (see our available countries page).

Frequently asked questions

Are reservations on the delivery note enough?

No, not in domestic transport. Article L. 133-3 of the Commercial Code requires a reasoned complaint notified to the carrier within three days excluding public holidays following receipt. Handwritten reservations are valuable evidence, but their written confirmation is the condition for the action to be admissible.

Does a fax transmission report carry weight in court?

It has the weight of free-form evidence. Commercial courts routinely accept it as an indication of the date of sending, especially when it is corroborated by a subsequent registered letter repeating the same wording. We develop this point in does a fax carry evidentiary weight before a judge.

What is the deadline for a late delivery?

Delay falls under the standard contracts annexed to the Transport Code for domestic flows: the claim must in principle be made in writing within one month following delivery. In international road transport, the CMR provides for twenty-one days. Check the clause in your contract, which may be stricter.

What if the goods never arrive at all?

Total loss escapes the foreclosure of Article L. 133-3, because no delivery took place. What remains is the one-year limitation period. Serve the carrier with a formal demand quickly: the date of interruption matters.

Should I fax the driver, the local depot or the head office?

The recipient designated in the carrier's general terms and conditions, generally the claims or complaints department, whose number appears on the back of the consignment note or on the company's website. A copy to the local depot does no harm, but does not replace notification to the correct department.

In summary

• In domestic transport, taking delivery extinguishes the action for damage or partial loss without a reasoned complaint within 3 days excluding public holidays (art. L. 133-3 Commercial Code).
• Vague reservations such as "subject to unpacking" are deemed ineffective: describe parcel by parcel.
• Fax serves to stop the clock outside business hours, confirm illegible reservations, forward urgent documents and serve formal demands before the one-year limitation period.
• Always combine fax on day one + registered letter on the next business day, with the same wording and a cross-reference.
• Proof of damage is built at receipt: timestamped photos, weighing, packaging kept, temperature log if the cold chain applies.
• For international road transport, the CMR applies: 7 days for non-apparent damage, 21 days for delay, one-year limitation period.
• Archive the transmission receipt together with a copy of the pages sent: without the transmission report, the fax proves nothing.