WIBON, WIPON, WICCON: Which One Actually Protects You at Chittagong
The four Ws shift congestion risk between owner and charterer, but Chittagong's tide-gated pilotage creates a delay type they weren't written for.
Every demurrage dispute we've watched unfold at Chittagong comes down to the same root question: when did laytime actually start? Not when the vessel berthed, not when discharge began, when the notice of readiness was validly tendered, under whatever wording the charter party actually used. Get the WIBON/WIPON wording wrong on a Bangladesh fixture and you've handed the owner a free pass through exactly the kind of anchorage queue this port is known for. Charterparty wording, bills of lading, claim documents, contemporaneous records and Bangladesh legal advice control the commercial position; this article is operational guidance, not a substitute for appointed counsel or insurers. Apply the fixture wording and current local practice; do not treat checklist examples as automatic entitlement.
Why this matters more here than at most ports
WIBON, WIPON, WIFPON and WICCON, collectively the "four Ws", exist to answer one question: can the master tender NOR before the vessel is actually alongside? WIBON (whether in berth or not) lets NOR stand even if no berth is free due to congestion. WIPON (whether in port or not) goes further, allowing NOR from the usual waiting area even outside the port's geographical limits. WIFPON covers free pratique, WICCON covers customs clearance. Each one shifts a specific risk from owner to charterer. At a port with a genuine, structural anchorage queue, which Chittagong has had for years, even with 2025's improved numbers, these clauses aren't boilerplate. They're the clause that decides who eats the cost of the queue.
What "arrived ship" actually means at Chittagong
English case law (The Kyzikos, The Maratha Envoy) draws a sharp line: WIBON only transfers congestion risk, not weather or navigational delay. If a vessel can't get to anchorage because of cyclone warning or rough sea conditions, that's not the situation WIBON was written for, courts read these clauses narrowly. At Chittagong specifically, this distinction matters because pilotage itself is tide-bound: even once a vessel reaches the outer anchorage and is genuinely "arrived" under a WIPON clause, harbour pilotage to jetty berthing is only available at daylight high water. A charterer who hasn't accounted for that tidal gating in the C/P risks laytime running against cargo interests for a delay that's really a navigational feature of the port, not congestion in the WIBON sense, and that's exactly the kind of distinction a P&I correspondent or the owner's lawyers will lean on if it goes to dispute.
The anchorage queue, in real numbers
Published port-wide performance may improve for a period without removing fixture-specific waiting risk. Berth order, cargo readiness, terminal allocation, weather, draft and traffic can still keep a vessel locked at anchorage. The charterparty should therefore address the intended NOR and waiting-time position expressly; owners and charterers should obtain legal advice on the actual wording rather than infer a result from a port average.
What we'd flag before you fix a Chittagong voyage
Reachable on arrival / always accessible warranties shift congestion risk onto the charterer outright, regardless of cause, that's a materially different allocation than WIBON/WIPON, and worth knowing which one you're actually agreeing to. If the C/P is silent on anchorage-to-berth shifting time, that gap tends to get resolved against whoever didn't think to specify it. And given Chittagong's tide-gated pilotage, a laytime clause that doesn't distinguish between congestion delay and tidal/navigational delay is incomplete for this port specifically, even if it's standard boilerplate everywhere else you trade.
The practical move
Before fixing into Chittagong, ask your agent for the current anchorage queue position and recent berthing turnaround, not a generic port profile, the actual situation that week. A C&F agent or customs broker working the discharge side can also flag whether DG cargo, IGM filing timing, or documentation gaps are likely to push WICCON-relevant delay onto your laytime clock. None of this replaces proper legal drafting, but it does mean you're negotiating the clause with real operational facts in hand rather than a template pulled from a different trade route entirely.
Fixing a Voyage into a Bangladesh Port?
Send the relevant charterparty or MOA, notices, SOF, invoices, claim correspondence, vessel schedule and P&I or insurer contact. CPA can preserve records and coordinate local attendance; legal advice, security and court action remain with appointed counsel and insurers.