If you fail to include a BOL with a shipment, then you will have no legal proof that you shipped the items. The consequences for not using a BOL would be the complete loss of the value of the shipment if it was lost or damaged during transportation.
While shipping losses continue to decline, items are lost or damaged in transit every year.1 If you want to be sure you are protected from any shipping losses, you’ll need to include an itemized BOL with every shipment you send.
Here is an example of the consequences for not using a BOL. A buyer visited a gallery in NYC and purchases four paintings. The buyer lived overseas and asked the gallery to ship the paintings to him. When the freight company picked up the paintings, the gallery staff forgot to include the BOL.
The ship transporting the paintings lost several containers overboard while at sea and the paintings were never delivered. Because there was no BOL included, the transport company refused to compensate the gallery for the loss of the paintings.
The gallery had to issue a refund to the buyer and compensate the artist. Without the BOL, the gallery had no legal recourse to recover the money for the lost paintings. Instead,the gallery lost more than the value of the paintings, since both the buyer and the artist required compensation. The shipping company could not be held accountable for the loss, since there was no record to prove the shipment had existed.