In recent days, Haikou Maritime Court has actively implemented the “Fengqiao Experience” of the New Era by means of “pre-litigation mediation + judicial confirmation”, which effectively helped eight crewmen successfully claim their wages and protect their legitimate rights and interests.

In July 2023, the eight crewmen involved in the case sought legal assistance from Boao Tribunal of Haikou Maritime Court to file a lawsuit to claim their unpaid wages. After carefully and comprehensively examining the details of the case, the handling judge found that it’s not a simple case of crewmen claiming wages, but involving multiple layers of legal relationships like ship affiliation and bareboat chartering, and involving various parties, including the registered shipowner and bareboat charterer, as the interested parties to the subject vessel. The legal relationships were complex and if the case to be handled through normal legal procedure, it could lead to a series of chain-reaction cases, delaying the timely payment of wages to the crewmen. Mediation, on the other hand, if successful in achieving a settlement among the parties, would significantly shorten the time it takes for the crewmen to claim their wages.

To assist the crewmen in swiftly recovering their wages, the handling judge communicated with all relevant parties, explaining in detail the legal consequences of unpaid wages and the potential compulsory measures the court might take once the case moved into trial procedure. With the judge’s patient guidance, all interested parties to the subject vessel and the crewmen agreed to resolve the wage dispute through the people’s court mediation platform. On 24 August, all parties jointly signed a mediation agreement, reaching a consensus on the payment of wages. Haikou Maritime Court legally confirmed and recognized the mediation agreement. Currently, all eight crewmen have successively received their initial payment of wages.

In this case, the eight crewmen came from various places, and as employees, they had not signed any service contracts. After the wage dispute arose, they faced difficulties in identifying the actual employers due to a lack of information, and being stranded on the ship. They could not endure the time and economic costs associated with long-term wage claims. After receiving the crewmen’s request to file a lawsuit, the judge, in less than a month, used the online mediation system to resolve the disputes, successfully helping the crewmen recover their wages. This significantly saved the crewmen’s economic and time costs, truly bringing closure to the case.

In the next steps, Haikou Maritime Court will continuously refine its trial and enforcement service mode, continue to promote diversified dispute resolution mechanisms, facilitate the governance of litigation sources, and provide more robust judicial support for resolving conflicts and disputes at their roots, optimizing the allocation of judicial resources, and enhancing the judicial satisfaction of the people.