This case involved maritime transport of cheeses from the Azores to Lisbon by sea under a bill of lading. The appellant cargo owner sued the defendant carrier in the Lisbon Maritime Court for EUR 24,959.94 for damage caused to the cheeses by being transported at an inappropriate temperature. The carrier argued that the owner's claim was extinguished by the time bar in art 3.6 of the Hague Rules. The owner argued that the Hague Rules and the limitation period laid down therein did not apply to the case, since it involved the defendant's non-contractual civil liability to the owner/importer, who was not a party to the contract of carriage.

The Lisbon Maritime Court held that the owner's claim was extinguished. The owner unsuccessfully appealed, and then appealed again in cassation to the Supreme Court of Justice.

Held: Appeal in cassation denied; judgment under appeal confirmed.

In the judgment at first instance it was held that the appellant intended, by the present action, to be compensated for damages resulting from the defective fulfilment of a sea carriage contract and that it should therefore have commenced that action within one year of the delivery of the goods, as required by art 3.6 of the International Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules on Bills of Lading, signed at Brussels on 25 August 1924, (the Hague Rules) which Portugal acceded to by letter dated 5 December 1931, published in the Government Gazette, I Series, dated 06.32.02 and which was made internal law by Decree Law No 37.748, dated 02.01.01 and, in the alternative, by the provisions of Decree Law No 352/86, from 21.10.

The appellant submitted that the Hague Rules were not applicable since it claimed compensation for damage suffered as the owner and importer of the goods transported and not as a contracting party to any transport contract, which is why the defendant's non-contractual liability was at issue. The Hague Rules and the aforementioned limitation period were thus not applicable, but rather the 'ordinary limitation period'. That is incorrect. The basis of the parties' relationship was a maritime contract to be carried out by the respondent or by the person who had been authorised to do so.

Further, it is shown that the transport was by the respondent. But would it have been carried out by the respondent without the intervention of the appellant and only with the intervention of the freight forwarding company with which it contracted? We believe not. Thus we cannot but conclude that the respondent was bound to the appellant by virtue of a transport contract that the freight forwarder, as the agent of the appellant, entered into with the respondent. And, therefore, as regards the expiry of the right to bring the present action on the ground that the contract was incorrectly complied with, the rules laid down in the abovementioned Hague Rules had to be considered. In the present case and in accordance with art 3.6 of the Hague Rules, the present action should have been brought within one year of 14 November 2001, the date on which the goods were delivered. It was commenced on 5 January 2005 - far beyond the deadline, therefore.