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Jean is Head of Dry Shipping (London) and specialises in shipping litigation, focussing on contractual shipping disputes including charterparties, bills of lading, cargo claims, commodities/trade disputes, MOA disputes, bunker disputes and shipbuilding disputes. She represents owners, charterers, shipyards and their insurers based internationally but has a particular geographical focus on the Japanese market, having worked in Tokyo for 6 months on secondment to an insurance client.

More about Jean

On the casualty side, Jean handles wet shipping disputes including fires and explosions on vessels (including engine room explosions) groundings, unsafe port disputes, container overboard losses, crane collapses and general average incidents. She is currently handling one of the biggest container collapse and overboard losses in maritime and also the grounding of a mega containership in the Suez Canal resulting in the blockage of the canal.

In relation to the MARPOL emissions regulations, Jean has advised owning and chartering clients on the impact/implications of the IMO 2020 “SOX” regulations and assisted with drafting and negotiating relevant clauses prior to the regulations coming into force, and currently advises on the EEXI/CII regulations. Jean also handles disputes arising from non compliance and/or breach of the SOX obligations.

Jean has worked in our Shanghai and Piraeus offices and is fluent in Mandarin. She is dual qualified in England & Wales, and in Singapore.

Most recently Jean has been recognised as one of Shipping's 'Leading Individuals' (Legal500 UK, 2022). Jean is also praised by clients for her expert, practical, commercial shipping knowledge and advice, efficiency - whether it be crisis management or dispute resolution, and her friendly client service:

“There is no one else in the market who can match Jean Koh. She always gets best possible results on complex matters without undue waste of time and costs. She is one of the best shipping lawyers, hugely knowledgeable and very user – friendly.”

"Jean has over 20 years of experience as a dispute resolution and commercial lawyer in the shipping industry. She is very commercially-minded and understands our complex business well. There are few lawyers who so thoroughly understand the varied businesses of company such as ours."

"We valued Jean Koh for her preparation, wide practice and ability to react calmly and logically in emergency situations. She was very well prepared, giving us options and examples from the practice in the shipping business."