The demurrage management guide
In this report
Where analyst time goes: Why most analyst time goes to process tasks that don’t require their expertise, and what that costs the portfolio.
Four points of leakage: The four structural points where recoverable entitlement goes unclaimed: calculation errors, slow reporting, missed time bars and key-person risk.
The cost of ambiguous clauses: How ambiguous or incomplete charter party terms lead to write-downs and delay claim submission.
Claims data as intelligence: How structured claims data reveals demurrage trends, port performance, costly clauses and counterparty patterns.
Into the next fixture: How claims outcomes feed voyage estimates and berth order, and change the negotiation dynamic with counterparties.
Summary
Dry bulk alone sees an estimated $8 to 10 billion in demurrage fees each year. Yet 99% of statements of facts are still handled manually, and roughly 75% of analyst time is absorbed by process work. That workload frames claims as a cost to be processed. The guide argues they are also a record of how ports, clauses and counterparties really perform. Manual workflows bury that record inside each claim.
The guide draws on industry benchmarks for claims workload, from hours per claim to team size, and includes Pacific Basin’s experience of moving from manual processing to an insight-driven model. It maps where recoverable entitlement slips away, and how claims outcomes can inform voyage cost estimates and fixture negotiation.
$8–10bn
in estimated dry bulk demurrage fees a year
99%
of SOFs are processed manually
75%
of analyst time goes to process tasks
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