Updated
Search for a container at the port and you will find listings for Hamburg, Bremerhaven, Rotterdam and Antwerp. What those listings describe is almost never a container standing on a quay. It is a unit in an empty-container depot in the port area or its hinterland: a yard where containers are stored, inspected, repaired and loaded onto lorries. Container terminals handle boxes moving on and off ships against bookings; they are not places where anyone buys equipment.
The distinction is practical, not pedantic. It decides how you take possession of the unit, what the driver needs at the gate, and whether the port location saves you money or only sounds reassuring. This guide sets out the sequence as it works for a buyer who is collecting a unit, taking road delivery, or putting it straight onto a ship.
Depots, not quays
Ports concentrate container equipment because that is where boxes come off hire and where traders buy them out of shipping-line and leasing fleets. The equipment ends up in depots: fenced yards, usually run by a depot operator on behalf of many owners, with reach stackers or forklifts to load vehicles. One depot can hold units belonging to dozens of owners, and it releases a unit only on the instruction of that unit's owner.
A listing that says "Hamburg" therefore tells you the region the unit stands in, not that you can drive to the port and pick one out. A depot is a working yard with heavy handling equipment, so access is controlled rather than open. That is why a container number, photographs and the details from the CSC plate are the normal basis for buying a port unit remotely.
What you are actually buying
Port offers come in three shapes, and it is worth knowing which one you have been quoted. Whichever it is, get the container number before the unit leaves the depot: it is the ISO 6346 identity that appears on the invoice, on the interchange receipt and, if the unit ships, on every transport document.
- A named unit — a specific container number with photographs and plate details. You know exactly which box you get. The right basis when condition matters or the unit will be shipped.
- A unit of a stated type and grade — for example one 40ft High Cube, cargo worthy, Hamburg area. The depot selects a unit that meets the description at release. Normal for lots and storage grades; agree beforehand what happens if the selected unit is disputed.
- A unit at a stated location — the price assumes the unit leaves from that depot. If it has to be repositioned first, that costs money, and it should be visible in the quotation rather than absorbed into it.
The release: what gets a unit out of the gate
A depot hands over a container only against a release from its owner. Depending on the depot it is called a release reference, release number or release order, and it states which unit or which type is to be handed over, to whom, and usually until when. The seller issues it once the sale is settled; the depot matches it when your vehicle arrives.
Three things go wrong with releases. The reference reaches the wrong haulier or is mistyped, and the driver is turned away. The release expires before collection and has to be reissued. Or the release names a type rather than a unit, and the depot loads something other than the box in the photographs. Check the reference, its validity and the unit before the lorry sets off, not from the depot gate.
You may also meet the word PIN. At Antwerp and Rotterdam, laden import containers have traditionally been collected from terminals with a PIN code, which both ports have been replacing with digital, identity-based release (Certified Pick-up, in Antwerp). That concerns import cargo leaving a terminal, not a container bought from a depot.
Gate-out and the interchange receipt
When the unit is loaded onto the vehicle, the depot records the handover on an equipment interchange receipt (EIR) or an equivalent gate document: container number, type, date and time, and the condition as seen at the gate, with any damage noted. The driver signs it.
That signature matters. Damage that is not noted at gate-out is hard to attribute afterwards, so the driver, or you if you are collecting, should walk round the unit before signing: doors open, close and lock, no holes in the roof or panels, floor intact, number matching the release. If the unit was bought on condition, compare it with the photographs there and then.
Ask in advance whether the depot's loading charge, often called lift-on, is included in the price or payable at collection. It is an avoidable argument at the gate.
Collecting it yourself or having it delivered
- Collection by your own haulier — the depot lifts the unit onto a container chassis, a flatbed with twistlocks or a tilt-bed. The vehicle must suit the container's length and weight, and the load must be secured. Unloading at your end is then yours to arrange, because the depot's forklift does not travel with the container. See container unloading.
- Road delivery — the unit is collected and set down at your address by tilt-bed or crane truck. We quote this as a delivered price on request, built from the unit, the depot it leaves from and what your site access requires. See container delivery.
- Delivery into a terminal — the unit goes from the depot straight to a container terminal for shipment. That works only against an existing booking, as set out below.
Buying at the port for export
If the container is going onto a ship, the order of events is fixed: booking, release, positioning, gate-in. The booking comes first because a terminal accepts an export container only against a booking reference for a named sailing, and every terminal sets cut-off times after which a container will not make that vessel. The booking is made by your freight forwarder or directly with a carrier. We supply the container and can deliver it to the terminal against that reference.
Agree the delivery term with your forwarder before anything is booked. A container is normally handed over at a terminal before it is on board, and ICC guidance on Incoterms 2020 points container shipments towards FCA rather than FOB for exactly that reason: FOB was written for goods passed onto the ship itself.
If you load your own cargo before it sails
A container bought at the port and filled with your goods is a shipper-owned container, and three requirements attach to the box and the load. The carrier, not the seller, decides whether it accepts the unit; see SOC containers for how that works.
- Valid CSC approval — the plate in date, or the unit under an approved continuous examination programme. See the CSC plate guide.
- Structural fitness — buy cargo worthy. Wind and watertight is a storage description and says nothing about carrying cargo at sea.
- Verified gross mass (VGM) — under SOLAS chapter VI, regulation 2, in force since 1 July 2016, the shipper must provide the verified gross mass of a packed container in time for the stowage plan. It is obtained either by weighing the packed and sealed container (Method 1) or by weighing all contents, including pallets, dunnage and securing material, and adding the container's tare (Method 2, using a procedure certified by the competent authority of the country where the container was packed). A packed container should not be loaded until the ship and the terminal have its VGM.
- Maximum gross mass — SOLAS also prohibits packing a container beyond the maximum gross mass on its CSC plate. The plate figure governs, not a generic table.
For an empty container shipped as cargo, the IMO guidelines say the tare marked on the container should be used. How the carrier wants that figure submitted is a booking detail for your forwarder. The IMO page on verification of the gross mass of a packed container sets out the rule.
When buying at the port saves money
A container price is half a price. The other half is moving the unit from where it stands to where it is needed, and a port location wins when those two places are close together. It does not win automatically: for an address far inland, a unit standing nearer the site can produce the better delivered figure, and for West African routings the loading port with the better service pattern can matter more than where the unit started, which is why Antwerp often appears in quotations for Ghana and Nigeria. We quote the origin that gives the best delivered or shipped price; see port delivery.
- Shipping out of the same port — a unit already standing near the loading port needs a short depot-to-terminal move and nothing more. Buying the same unit inland and trucking it to the coast adds a road leg that does nothing for the container.
- Collecting near the port with your own transport — the cheapest way to take possession if you have a suitable vehicle.
- Delivering to an address near the coast — northern Germany from Hamburg or Bremerhaven; the Benelux, northern France and the Rhineland often from Rotterdam or Antwerp.
What to tell us when you ask for a port price
A port quotation can be priced exactly once these points are known. Send them with your quote request:
- Collection, road delivery to an address, or delivery into a terminal
- The port area you want to buy in, or the final destination so that origins can be compared
- Container type, size, condition grade and quantity
- For terminal delivery: the booking reference, the terminal and the cut-off
- Whether you will load cargo into the unit, which makes a valid CSC plate a hard requirement