Shipping Container Bolt Seals

Product Description

ISO 17712.2 & C-TPAT Compliant, Budget Shipping Container bolt seals are usually an essential requirement for exporting container shipments. They consist of a numbered bolt and cap which can clearly show if the container has been tampered with or broken into during transit. If the sender records the seal number before it leaves and checks it upon arrival, to make sure it matches, they can clearly and easily see if the container has been opened or broken into. Budget Shipping Container bolt seals all have the prefix BSC.

These meet all standard requirements for sealing an export container and are good for use for shipments to or through the USA.

See more about shipping container bolt seals in this brief video:

Why do you need a bolt seal

Export shipments will all need a bolt seal.

If you use a padlock to seal your container and customs want a look, they will simply cut your padlock off. Using a padlock is also less helpful in the event of a break in. When bolt seals are used, the seal number should be recorded at every step of the chain.

You may assume that a typical expert movement has 3 steps in the chain, from truck at your site to the port, then shipped out to your destination country and onto another truck at the destination port out to your destination address.

In reality such a move may have may more steps involved. The container may get loaded on a truck at your site, run to a rail-head, catch a train to the port. Once on the boat your shipping container may transship through a number of other ports on its way to destination, and the container may at times also be stood down in depots on its way to or from a port or railhead.

If the seal number is properly recorded, in the event of a break in the ‘chain’ can be examined and the exact point at whcih the seal was broken can be discovered.

This may not seem super secure but its a method that has shown to work over the years. The industry will quickly stop working with any ‘link’ in the chain where containers are regularly broken into, (or other measures can be taken such as getting the local authorities involved). The vast majority of companies in the container supply chain are long term professional outfits. They all understand the importance of container security measures and that they will not stay in business very long if they are also involved with breaking into shipping containers.

It is also common to be able to get cargo insurance for your shipment with a shipping container that has been sealed. Shipping lines and ports wont’ accept a container without a seal number to record. They may accept a shipping container with both a padlock and a seal, but they wont’ accept a shipping container with a padlock and no seal.

Very finally shipping your container with only a padlock on it will look to a customs agent as though this is a novice shipper or someone new to shipping. This may suggest to the customs agent that this is a container that they want to look at. Most of the time you will be hit with an additional charge if customs want a close look at your shipping container, so its worth making sure you have a quality seal in place whenever you export a shipping container.

These seals meet or exceed the international requirements and can only be removed by bolt cutters or similar. They have been specifically designed to not ‘spin off’ as some other bolt seals do.

Most shipping companies will provide a bolt seal free of charge and on occasion even the hauliers moving the containers from loading destination to port have been known to fit bolt seals. It is a popular alternative to a padlock.

For bulk orders over 500 seals, we can also have the seals made with your own 3 letter prefix. Please contact us for bulk enquiries over 250 seals

Shipments to Northern Ireland

Currently due to customs requirements, we can only ship multiples of 250 bolt seals to Northern Ireland customers. There are no extra charges for this.

Buy Online

You can now order these bolt seals on our website using a credit or debit card. Please see these ordering notes for online orders:

Order Information

• For payment processing, you will be transferred away from our website to a Monek payments portal for card payment processing, and return to our website once this is complete. We and our website have no ability to see your card details.
• We pre authorise all payments at the time of your order, the full payment is then only taken when we are processing your order (usually the next working day) .
• Please check your Junk or Spam folders if you do not see a confirmation email after making payment as these automated confirmation emails may get caught by spam filters.
• We currently have a £300 + VAT maximum online order value. Above this value please contact us and we can raise and send a manual invoice. We will not process multiple orders made online to try and beat the maximum limit
• Apologies but we don’t’ accept American Express cards.
• We can offer manual ordering on any of these items that you can also purchase online. If you prefer to receive a proforma invoice for payment, or if you have any troubles with card payments please contact us and we can process this manually for you.
• Our orders are not fully automated, a member of our team will process this order when we are next in the office.
• Please include a contact number and name for your delivery. We may call this number to confirm the order, and we may not finalise any order until we have spoken to someone on the phone to confirm the order. (we will always email you if there is any problem with your order if we cannot reach you by phone)
• We can only deliver goods to UK customers at this time.
• For fraud prevention purposes we will only accept online card payments from credit cards registered in the UK (with a UK billing address). If you have a special case (e.g. a foreign government procurement card) please contact our office and we can make special arrangements.
• We will never sell your personal information to 3rd parties or spam you with endless sales emails. This isn’t our style