Members are alerted to a serious repeat issue over cargo discharge quantities in Turkey. In particular if there is an  excess  or  over landing  of cargo as against the Bill of Lading figures. Consequences include Customs fines as well as extra storage costs, and delays to the vessel. This issue has been known to affect both dry bulk and liquid cargoes consigned to Turkey. In one recent example, a discrepancy of almost 300 mt was estimated to lead to a fine of about USD140,000. The Association's Correspondents have advised that under Turkish Customs Law, it is the vessel that has to provide an explanation of any discrepancy between the quantity determined by the Customs Office and the cargo documents. Further, it should be noted that the 1st paragraph of the Article 237 of the Customs Code numbered 4458, which governed the fines for both short and over landed cargoes, reads as follows (free translation): "In the default of demonstrating within the period prescribed by the customs administration, that the packages, proved to be deficient as a result of the amount registered in the summary declarations or the commercial or official papers used as summary declarations submitted to the customs administration by the owners, captains and agents of the vehicles, have not been loaded from their provenance or have been unloaded in another port or lost or stolen due to any accident or average; and provided that the tariff classification of the goods kept within these deficient packages cannot be determined, a fine shall be charged on these goods, at an amount under their tariff classification or if tariff classification cannot be determined, under the highest dutiable classification of the chapter in accordance with the nature and the description of the goods." In order to successfully challenge a fine, our Correspondents advise that the responsible parties, namely Owners / Master / and local Agents of the vessel must provide a certificate from the loading