Time Charter

A Time Charter is the type of charter party where the charterer hires a vessel for an agreed period — anything from one voyage to many years — paying the shipowner a daily hire rate. The shipowner provides the vessel fully manned, victualled and maintained; the charterer pays for the bunker fuel, port charges and stevedoring, and decides where the vessel trades.

Time charters introduce concepts not found in voyage charters: delivery and redelivery (the vessel is "delivered" to the charterer at trip start and "redelivered" at end), hire paid in advance (typically monthly or 15-day periods), off-hire for unavailability, and warranted speed/consumption performance criteria.

Standardised forms include NYPE (New York Produce Exchange — most common globally), BALTIME, SHELLTIME (tankers), and BOXTIME (containers).