ICC’s Publishing Department announced today that the Commentary on UCP 600, written by the drafting group that produced ICC’s universally used rules on documentary credits, UCP 600, is now available to the public. The long-awaited publication gives an invaluable insight into the thinking of those who drafted the new Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits, also known as UCP 600.

UCP 600 is the first revision of  ICC’s rules on documentary credits for 13 years. After three years of preparation, the new rules came into effect on 1 July 2007.

Other UCP revisions have been followed by ICC publications comparing past versions of the rules with the new. But Gary Collyer, chair of the drafting group, noted that UCP 600 incorporated wording that existed in various sections of the previous version, UCP 500. For that reason, he said, “the group decided that a publication comparing one set of rules with another would be too unwieldy and that a commentary on the rules themselves would prove to be more beneficial.”

Commentary on UCP 600, which reflects the consensus view of drafting group members, is an article-by-article review of each of the 39 articles of the new UCP. It contains:

• the text of the new article
• the key changes from UCP 500
• a commentary explaining the rationale for the new language, and
• a cross-reference to other articles in UCP 600

“The aim has been to provide a commentary that enlightens practitioners as to the thought processes behind the changes in each article and to explain why a change was introduced and, in some cases, why no change was made,” Mr Collyer said.

Mr Collyer stressed that Commentary reflected the personal views of the UCP drafting group. “Users of Commentary should be reminded that any decision to accept or reject documents should be based on the text of the underlying documentary credit and the applicable rules of UCP 600,” he said.

Order Commentary on UCP 600 now from the ICC Business Bookstore