James Allman | JA Technology Solutions LLC
Incoterms 2020 Reference & Comparison
Browse all 11 Incoterms 2020 rules, compare any two side by side, and see the classic responsibility matrix for risk, freight, duty, and insurance.
Incoterms 2020 Reference & Comparison
All 11 Incoterms 2020 rules in one reference: the seven that work for any mode of transport (EXW, FCA, CPT, CIP, DAP, DPU, DDP) and the four for sea and inland waterway only (FAS, FOB, CFR, CIF). Each rule expands to show the seller's and buyer's responsibilities, the exact point where risk transfers, the insurance obligation (only CIP and CIF impose one), and where the rule is commonly used. A comparison mode puts any two rules side by side on the points that decide negotiations: mode, risk transfer, who arranges the main carriage, who pays import duty, and insurance. A responsibility matrix shows the classic who-does-what chart across all 11 rules at once: export packing, export clearance, main carriage, insurance, import clearance, and import duty. Everything is summarized in plain words for orientation against the authoritative ICC publication. Runs entirely in your browser.
Learn more ↓
Loading interactive explorer...
What Incoterms Decide, and What They Leave Alone
An Incoterm splits three things between seller and buyer: who pays each cost along the way, where the risk of loss or damage transfers, and who handles tasks like export clearance, carriage, and unloading. Equally important is what the rules do not decide. When title to the goods transfers, how and when payment happens, and what law governs a dispute all live elsewhere in the contract, and assuming the three-letter code covers them is a classic mistake. The 2020 revision changed less than people expect: DAT became DPU, and the insurance a seller must buy under CIP was raised to all-risks level cover while CIF kept minimum cover.
Why the Wrong Term Costs Real Money
The expensive mistakes are predictable. A seller quotes DDP without realizing that means acting as importer of record and paying duty and taxes in the buyer's country, often without a way to recover them. A buyer agrees to CPT believing the seller's freight payment means the seller's risk, then discovers the risk transferred at the first carrier when a claim arises mid-transit. Containers move under FOB out of habit when FCA matches how terminals actually work. And because many customs administrations value imports on a CIF basis, the term feeds directly into the duty math: the Landed Cost Calculator turns that who-pays-what split into an all-in per-unit cost, and the HS/HTS Tariff Code Lookup covers the classification driving the duty rate.
Carrying the Term Through Your Systems
A term agreed in a contract only works when the systems repeat it: on the purchase order, in the EDI documents that mirror it, and in the cost allocation that decides whether freight belongs in inventory cost. I build purchasing and import integrations that carry the Incoterm from the order through the paperwork to the landed cost, so the contract and the books agree. See EDI services or integration services.
All tools run entirely in your browser. Your data never leaves your machine.