Editorial policy

Quotepad's generators and guides deal with documents that customs officers, banks and buyers rely on, so every factual statement on this site has to be traceable to a source you can open yourself. This page explains how we research, check and correct what we publish.

Who writes Quotepad

Quotepad is an independent browser tool for preparing export quotations and shipping documents. We are not a law firm, customs broker, bank or freight forwarder, and nothing on the site is legal, tax, banking or customs advice. Where a rule depends on the importing country or the contract, the page says so and points you to your buyer's customs broker or your bank.

Where our facts come from

• Primary sources first. The International Chamber of Commerce for Incoterms® 2020, the U.S. International Trade Administration for export documents, the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations (19 CFR) for U.S. customs rules, and government guidance such as GOV.UK. Carrier and bank pages are used only for their own procedures.
• Every source is listed and dated. Each page ends with its sources and the date we opened them. If a source cannot be opened, the claim it supported is removed.
• Summaries, not copies. We summarise rules in our own words. We do not reproduce the Incoterms® rules, which are the ICC's copyright; the chart is a summary that links to the ICC's own materials.
• No invented numbers. Freight rates, premiums and prices in worked examples are illustrative and labelled as such. The arithmetic is checked by the scripts that build the pages: for example, the FOB and CIF worked example on the quotation page is recalculated on every build and the build fails if a figure on the page disagrees.

How pages are checked and updated

Pages that summarise rules carry the date they were last checked. We re-read the sources when a rule changes (a new Incoterms® edition, a change to a customs regulation) and when a reader reports a problem. Generator pages are tested automatically: the documents are built in four types, five document languages and two paper sizes, and each must fit its page with every character printable.

Independence

Quotepad is free and carries no advertising or sponsored content, and no one pays to be mentioned. Links to Billpad, Livnaro and other Quotepad tools are links to our own sister tools, shown where they help with the next step. Links to official sources are there so you can check us.

Corrections

If something on a page is wrong or out of date, tell us through the contact page with the page address and, if you can, the source that shows the correct position. We check the report against the source, correct the page and update its checked date.

Last updated: 29 October 2026