[Bill of Exchange The majority of international payments are made by way of bills of exchange eithe

The majority of international payments are made by way of bills of exchange either with or without a documentary credit. There are five parties to a bill of exchange : drawer, drawee, payee, acceptor and endorser.

The drawer is the person who draws the bill and the drawee is the person(or firm) on whom the bill is drawn. The payee is the person or firm to whom the bill is payable and it is most frequently the drawer. The acceptor is the person who undertakes to pay the bill by writing his acceptance across the face of the bill. An acceptance is a legal undertaking to pay the amount of the bill. An endorser is a person who endorses a bill by signing his name on it(usually on the back).

A bill is negotiated when it is transferred from one person to another in such a way as to constitute the transferee , the holder of the bill. A bearer bill is one that can be passed on by mere delivery. It is one that has been made out "X days after date pay the bearer,etc. " or one made out to a fictitious payee , or one which has been endorsed in blank,i. e. the last endorser has not given any instructions but merely signed his name. A bearer bill does not need to be endorsed by those who negotiate it , but to some extent it is less reliable than a bill with many endorsements. Bills which are not bearer bills are negotiated by endorsement and delivery. Those endorsing a bill as agents or representatives of a company can make this clear so that they are not personally liable.

When a bill is presented for acceptance, the drawee should accept it, if he refuses to do so, claiming perhaps that he has not authorized the bill to be drawn and knows nothing about it, the bill is dishonored by non-acceptance. If a bill is presented for payment on the due date,and the acceptor refuses to pay it,then the bill is dishonored by non-payment. It is now necessary for the holder to take certain action to protect himself.

· He must give notice of dishonor to the drawer and all other endorsers of the bill. In practice he usuaUy gives notice of the dishonor to the person from whom he obtained the bill , who gives notice to the person from whom he obtained it and the bill moves backwards towards the drawer. The process could be short-circuited if certain of the endorsers were famous names, for example accepting houses, who could easily be approached directly to honor the bill. Eventually the drawer must honor it, and he will bring an action against the acceptor.

· If it is a foreign bill, he must protest the bill, to safeguard his rights against the drawer and endorsers. There are two ways of obtaining formal evidence of the dishonor of the bill. The first is called "noting" the bill. The holder asks a notary public to re-present the bill. This official,when refused either acceptance or payment as the case may be,then writes on the face of the bill that it was dishonored. The " note" constitutes formal evidence of dishonor , so it is necessary to use the bill as evidence in court. With foreign bills a more formal process called " protesting" , is carried out. The notary public re-presents the bill, and if it is dishonored he draws up a formal certificate of dishonor,the protest. The protest must contain a copy of' the boill,and be signed by the notary making it. It must then specify the person at whose request the bill is being protested, the place and date of protest, the cause or reason for protesting the bill,the demand made and the answer given, or the fact that the drawee or acceptor could not be found. Protest will usually be done on the day of dishonor,but if there is good reason why this is not possible, it must be done with reasonable diligence after the delay has occurred. This might arise where the bill was presented by post and returned dishonored by post.

The legal consequences of dishonor may be listed as follows :

(a) The protesting of a foreign bill secures the position of the holder against all previous endorsers and the drawer. They become liable to compensate the holder for the loss he has suffered.

(b)ln practice the holder will turn to the person from whom he obtained the bill and will be put in funds by that person. That person then tums to his endorser and so on.

It might appear that a break in the chain could develop in the case of a bearer bill, because the bill is transferred by mere delivery and the transferor by delivery does not put his name on the bill. Although a person who transfers by delivery is not liable on the bill to the whole world , he is liable to his immediate transferee , because he warrants that the bill is what is purports to be , that he has right to transfer it , and that at the time of transferring it he knew of no fact rendering it valueless.

(c) Eventually the bill reaches the drawer who honors it and turns to the acceptor. They may agree to renew the bill with suitable arrangements on interest if the acceptor's difficulties are purely temporary. If this is not agreeable, the drawer may begin an action which will end in judgment for the drawer, possibly in distraint on the assets of the acceptor,or even in his bankruptcy.

Sometimes bills are "claused" with phrases which require the drawee to pay more than the actual value of the bill. There are three chief reasons why these were introduced over the years. First , the aim was to throw the burden of any exchange risk on to the foreign drawee. Second,it was to enable the drawer to provide for the payment of interest by the drawee,in order to compensate the drawer for the time taken for the drawee's payment to reach him. Third, a clause was often helpful in permitting the banker to act as an arbiter in deciding what rate of exchange to use when the drawee paid in local currency.

When the exporters and importers have been trading with one another for some time and have built up a satisfactory trading relationship, they may decide to dispense with documentary credits and rely solely on documentary bills as a means of payment. This means that the exporter will ship his goods and attach the documents relating to the consignment to the bill of exchange, which he draws on the importer. The bill and documents are then sent through the exporter's bank to the importer's bank (or another bank in the importer's country) for acceptance and/or payment. If they decide to trade on the basis of a clean bill of exchange then, the exporter will send the documents directly to the importer. The exporter loses control over the documents once he has parted with them and must rely upon the good faith of the importer for ultimate acceptance and payment of the bill.

A bill of exchange is a useful device not only as a means of settlement but also,if it is a usance bill as a means of obtaining credit. An exporter, having drawn a usance bill on his buyer,may obtain funds immediately by negotiating the bill or by borrowing from his bank against the bill that is sent for collection. The importer has the usance of the bill as a period of credit and may be able to resell the goods and obtain the proceeds before the maturity date of the bill. The bill is also useful as evidence of a debt , which can be used in a court of law.

When a biU of exchange is drawn under a documentary credit the drawer is assured of acceptance and payment by the issuing bank provided that he has fulfilled all the terms and conditions of the credit. No such assurance exists without a documentary credit, however , and therefore not to trade on a documentary bill basis is much more risky from the point of view of the exporter. Nevertheless, as the documents are channeled through the banking system with instructions that they should be handed over to the importer only against acceptance or payment of the bill, the system obviously does offer more protection than trading on the basis of clean bills of exchange.

If the exporter asks his bank to collect a documentary bill on his behalf, he instructs the bank to release the documents against acceptance of the bill, the bill is known as a D/ A bill. If the documents are to be released only against payment the bill is a D/P bill. While a sight bill is drawn the documents will be handed over only against payment, but for the majority of usance bills the instruction to the bank is to release the documents against acceptance of the bill. In some countries, particularly in the Far East, the documents may not be handed over until payment, even if the exporter wishes them to be released against acceptance. This encourages the importer to pay the bill before maturity. In some countries, it is possible for the importer legally to demand the documents upon acceptance of the bill, even though the exporter's instructions are for documents against payment. The drawee of a bill is entitled to inspect the documents. If the bill is a D/P bill, the drawee is usually allowed to respect them at the bank.

The process of discounting a foreign bill of exchange is called negotiation. The procedure is similar to that of discounting a domestic bill,in that the banker buys the bill and hands over the face value of it less discount,but there are some differences. Unlike a domestic bill,the bill will probably not have been accepted and may be either a sight bill or a usance bill. Indeed there may not be a bill at all as the documents may be negotiated on their own ones. When a bank negotiates a bill,it in effect buys it and then sends it for collection in its own right. However, it usually requires the exporter to sign a form undertaking to recompense the bank in the event of the bill being unpaid.

The amount of interest charged by a bank on a negotiation is calculated on the period between the date of negotiation and the date on which the bank receives the proceeds , and will include the time in getting the bill presented for acceptance , for it is only then that the usance of most bills begins to become effective.

Another expense that will be deducted by the negotiating bank will be the postal charges and stamp duty ,if any, plus a commission.

Questions for reading :