A Note on Marine Insurance Culture
In Japan, cargo insurance is deeply embedded in trade practice. Most importers of any size carry cargo insurance as a matter of course.
However, the practical handling of marine cargo insurance claims is more concentrated than it may appear from outside. The majority of insurance brokers and agents in Japan handle cargo insurance as a peripheral product. They sell the policy but have limited practical knowledge of international trade, ocean transportation or how marine cargo claims actually work in practice.
In reality, substantive claims handling is typically managed directly by the insurance companies themselves, because most agents and brokers lack the trade and logistics background to handle it independently.
This is not a criticism. It reflects the reality that genuine expertise in marine cargo insurance requires a combination of knowledge that is rarely found in a single organisation — international trade practice, ocean freight operations, Bill of Lading law, survey procedure and insurance coverage analysis together.
For the past twenty-five years, Interlink has operated as Japan's only dedicated marine cargo insurance agency with this combined expertise.
For overseas forwarders handling Japan-bound cargo, this means that when a claim arises or a coverage question needs a real answer, there is a counterpart in Japan who can engage at a practical level — not just forward the question to an insurer.