Kuwait Court of Cassation principle number 363

Summary: - The consignor's submission, upon handing the goods to the air carrier, of a special declaration of the importance he attaches to their delivery at the destination, and his payment of any supplementary carriage charge the carrier may require in return. Its effect. The carrier is obliged to compensate the damage up to the amount stated by the consignor. Articles 222 and 214 of the Commercial Code. The challenged judgment's departure from this and its award of material and moral compensation for loss of the shipment below the value specified by the consignor in the carriage document. An error in applying the law requiring its cassation. Rule: The provision in Article 222 of the Commercial Code that the air carrier shall be liable within the limits prescribed in Article 214, whatever the capacity of the parties to the liability action and whatever their number or the amount of compensation due, and the provision in the second paragraph of Article 214 of that Code that “In the carriage of baggage or goods, compensation shall not exceed 6 dinars per kilogram. However, if the consignor, upon handing the baggage or goods to the carrier, submits a special declaration of the importance he attaches to their delivery at the destination and pays any supplementary carriage charge the carrier may require in return, the carrier shall be bound by the value stated in the declaration, unless the carrier proves that this value exceeds the extent of the actual importance the consignor attached to delivery,” mean, as stated in the explanatory memorandum to the Law, that if the consignor, upon handing the goods or baggage to the carrier, submits a special declaration of the importance he attaches to their delivery at the destination and pays any supplementary carriage charge the carrier may require in return—as in the carriage of bullion, jewelry and rare antiques—the carrier is obliged in that case to compensate the damage up to the amount stated by the consignor. Since the challenged judgment departed from this view and awarded the respondent material and moral compensation for his loss of the dispatched shipment, although compensation arising from the air carrier's liability in the carriage of registered baggage and goods is assessed on the basis of the value specified by the consignor in the carriage document, it is vitiated by an error in applying the law requiring its cassation.