Shipping Instructions Format for Word, Excel and PDF

The shipper's written instruction to a carrier or forwarder setting out exactly how the transport document should be prepared: parties, routing, equipment, cargo particulars, weights, freight terms, requested document type and release method. They are submitted against a confirmed booking and are what the carrier's draft Bill of Lading is built from.

The deadline by which complete shipping instructions must reach the carrier for a given sailing. It is earlier than the physical cargo cut-off — often a day or more — because the carrier needs time to produce the draft and file the manifest. Missing it typically means a delayed document, a late-SI fee, or a B/L produced from incomplete booking data.

No. Shipping instructions are the shipper's instruction; the Bill of Lading is the carrier's document, evidencing its receipt of the goods and its contract of carriage. The instructions have no effect against third parties and confer no title. They matter because everything on the B/L comes from them.

Verified Gross Mass is the total weight of a packed container including cargo, packaging, dunnage and the container tare. Under SOLAS it must be provided before the container can be loaded, and the responsibility rests on the shipper named on the Bill of Lading. It must be obtained by weighing — either the packed container, or all the contents plus the stencilled tare under a certified procedure — never estimated.

It depends on the carrier. Most now prefer their own portal or an EDI channel, which validates entries as you go and produces materially fewer errors. Where a Word or Excel submission is accepted or required — common with forwarders and on some trades — this worksheet exports DOCX and XLSX alongside the PDF.

Expect a late documentation fee, a delayed draft, and in the worst case a B/L produced from booking data alone — which will be missing the very details you needed to control. On trades with advance manifest requirements, a late SI can also make the filing deadline unachievable, which risks the container being refused loading.

All four that apply to the movement. Place of receipt and place of delivery describe where the carrier's custody begins and ends on a multimodal move; port of loading and port of discharge describe the sea leg. On a port-to-port shipment the first and last may be blank. Include UN/LOCODEs alongside the names — place names are ambiguous in a way codes are not.

Increasingly yes. Many carriers require an HS code at manifest level, and some destinations mandate it for advance filings. Even where it is not required, providing it reduces the risk of a manifest query. Give the six-digit international heading at minimum, and the national extension where the destination requires it.

State it explicitly in the instructions, before the document is issued. The release method must be decided in advance: once originals have been printed and issued, switching to express release requires all originals to be returned to the carrier. State the document type, the release method and the number of originals as three separate, deliberate answers.

The SI cut-off is a documentation deadline — when your instructions must reach the carrier. The cargo cut-off is a physical deadline — when the full container must be inside the terminal. They are independent, and there is usually also a separate VGM cut-off and a customs cut-off. Missing any one of them can roll the container even if the others were met comfortably.

It should be consistent, and where a documentary credit governs payment it must match the credit's wording exactly. Customs needs specificity — generic descriptions attract examination — while credits need literal compliance. Where the two pull in different directions, resolve it before submission with your broker and the bank rather than after the document is issued.

Yes. Where a booking confirmation, commercial invoice and packing list have been extracted for the same shipment, the reviewed data can be reused to prepare an editable shipping-instructions draft, so parties, routing, equipment and cargo particulars are carried across rather than retyped.

You can complete the browser form and download a generated PDF. Editable XLSX and DOCX starter files are also available for offline work.

The template form is designed to keep entries in the browser while you prepare the document. Review the finished file before sharing it with a carrier, customer, broker or authority.

No. Submit by the carrier cut-off and verify the carrier-issued draft. This document itself is not a Bill of Lading.