BUNKER DISPUTE RESOLUTION WORKSHOP

Tuesday 24 May 2016 ~ 09:00 -12:00

This highly professional interactive workshop on bunker dispute resolution will address the causes of bunker disputes, the resolution of those disputes when they happen and the avoidance of those disputes so that they don’t happen in the first place. It will look at how changing economic and regulatory conditions may give rise to new disputes – whether about bunker quality, quantity, delivery or payment issues – and examine ways that such disputes may be resolved.

Participants will share examples of contemporary, real-life disputes. The training process will provide enough basic training to help participants make significant financial savings before any actual bunker disputes arise, including avoiding and resolving those disputes economically if and when they do arise.

LECTURER

J. Stephen Simms is a Principal of Simms Showers LLP with offices in Baltimore and Leesburg, Virginia. Simms Showers is one of the most active US firms working in the area of vessel arrest, maritime attachment, and related maritime remedies for creditors. On average in any given year, Simms Showers has arrested or attached three or more vessels a month, around the world. The firm has achieved significant costs savings for its clients in vessel arrests, by assembling groups of creditors to share arrest costs, having a network of experienced local counsel, utilising electronic data transfer, databases and a network of other reliable sources for vessel tracking, working with maritime factors, and through the volume of its practice, making it familiar with arrest procedure in every major United States port.

Mr Simms is a graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law (Chicago) (J.D., 1983), where he was selected for and served as Editor‑in‑Chief of the Northwestern Journal of International Law and Business and was selected for its award as Outstanding Editor. He holds an M.A. in International Studies (with concentrations in International Economics and International Law and Organisation) from The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (1980), and a B.A. in International Studies from The Johns Hopkins University (1979).

He is a member of the bars of the United States Supreme Court, the states of Maryland and Illinois, the District of Columbia, the United States Court of International Trade; United States Courts of Appeal for the Third, Fourth, Fifth, Seventh, and Eleventh Circuits; United States District Courts for the District of Maryland (Trial Bar), District of Columbia, Northern District of Illinois, and through special admission.