A late off-road caravan order is usually described as one delay, but it is two. Production slips for reasons the factory controls, and shipping slips for reasons the carrier controls. What you recover is decided by what the order said before the deposit was paid, which is why the schedule belongs in the contract, not in an email thread.

Two clocks, and only one of them is the factory's

The build clock covers material procurement, chassis fabrication, fit-out, inspection and packing — the only part of the timeline an off-road caravan manufacturer can be held to, and the only part you can write terms around. The shipping clock starts when the unit is ready to leave the yard; vessel space, flat-rack availability and rollovers belong to the forwarder and the carrier.

Where risk sits depends on the Incoterm: on FOB terms the factory's obligation ends when the unit is loaded, so everything after that is a carriage and insurance matter. Treating the two clocks as one number is what leaves importers arguing about a delay that is not the factory's at all.

Fix the schedule, not the lead time

A single lead-time figure is close to useless as a contract term. Six items matter more:

• Specification freeze date. Drawings, options and market build approved in writing; the build clock starts here, not at the enquiry.
• Production start and inspection window. Two dates, so inspection is booked rather than squeezed in at the end.
• Loading date and latest-ship date. These two decide whether the units arrive inside your selling season.
• Space on a named sailing. A build slot without an allocated flat rack still leaves the unit at the port.
• A grace period with a stated consequence. Late by a defined margin and something changes, rather than a clause that only exists on paper.
• Dated progress photos. Chassis, panel, fit-out, packing — the cheapest evidence you will ever collect.

The remedy ladder when a date slips

Begin with a written revised schedule carrying a real date; "soon" cannot be enforced. Then work up: air-freight the critical parts so units already on hand can be finished and sold, take a credit against the next order, and keep cancellation of the undelivered balance with recovery of the unconsumed deposit as the last step.

Accept that some losses are not recoverable. Lost retail margin, lost bookings and penalties you owe your own customers are consequential losses, normally excluded by the sales contract and not covered by cargo insurance, which responds to physical damage rather than to time. Delay is managed with buffer stock and a realistic season plan, not with a claim.

Making the date hold

Buy the build slot and the shipping space as one package, and stage the money against verified milestones rather than a calendar, so the delivery date stays commercially important to the factory. Keep a first order small enough that a slip does not sink the season, and record every promised date so a pattern becomes visible early. Above all, look for a supplier whose schedule has already survived a peak season — read what their importers say about delivery as carefully as what they say about quality.

The 16ft hard-top models are rated to a 3,000 kg ATM and each unit travels as one 40 ft flat rack, so the loading date is the real constraint on any order. Send the market, model and month you need the units on your showroom floor, and the build and shipping dates can be planned backwards from there. Write to [email protected] with the schedule you are working to, or send a short message on WhatsApp: +86 186 6381 3961 if a date is already moving; the published range is at www.lgloader.com.

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