Last updated: 1 August 2026
1. What cookies are
A cookie is a small text file that a website asks your browser to store. On your next visit the browser hands it back, which is how a site can remember that you already dismissed a notice, which region you were browsing, or that a form was half completed. Similar technologies include local storage, session storage and small tracking pixels in emails.
Cookies cannot read files on your device, cannot run programs and cannot carry viruses. What they can do is identify a browser across pages and visits, which is why the law treats non-essential cookies as something you should be able to refuse.
2. Why a shipping website uses cookies at all
Most of what this site does is publishing: country guides, rate guidance, schedules and articles. Cookies are used to keep that working properly and to see which guides people actually read, so we spend time expanding the pages that answer real questions rather than the ones we assume matter.
Nothing on this site requires you to accept optional cookies. Quotations are prepared by people at the freight desk, and you can obtain one entirely by telephone or email without any cookie beyond the strictly necessary ones being set.
3. Strictly necessary cookies
These cookies make the website function and cannot be switched off through the site. They support things like page routing, security tokens on forms, load balancing between servers and remembering that you have already responded to a cookie notice.
Because they are essential to a service you have requested, they do not require consent, but they are also the least interesting: they hold no marketing profile and are typically deleted when you close the browser or shortly afterwards.
- Session and routing cookies that keep pages and forms working
- Security cookies that protect quotation forms against abuse
- A short-lived record of your response to the cookie notice itself
4. Preference cookies
Preference cookies remember choices you make so the site behaves consistently: a region you were browsing, a rate table you expanded, or details you began typing into a quotation form so a refresh does not lose them.
They improve convenience rather than function. If you refuse them the site still works, but it will treat every visit as a first visit and forget your selections.
5. Analytics cookies
Analytics cookies count visits and tell us in aggregate which pages are read, how people arrive, whether a country guide answers the question or sends the reader straight back to a search engine, and which device sizes we should test against.
We are interested in patterns rather than individuals. Analytics data is not used to build advertising profiles, is not sold, and where the tool allows it we shorten or mask IP addresses so reports cannot be tied to a single person.
6. Third-party content and embedded services
Some pages may embed content served by other organisations, such as web fonts, mapping tiles showing a port location, or a video explaining a loading process. Those providers can set their own cookies when the content loads, under their own policies rather than ours.
Where an embedded service is not essential we keep it off the page or replace it with a static image and a link, precisely so that visiting a country guide does not quietly involve half a dozen third parties.
7. How long cookies last
Session cookies live only until you close the browser. Persistent cookies last for a defined period, commonly from a few days for form assistance up to around thirteen months for analytics identifiers, after which they expire unless refreshed by a later visit.
Clearing cookies in your browser removes them immediately, and clearing them will also remove any record that you refused optional cookies, so the notice may appear again on your next visit.
8. Controlling cookies in your browser
Every mainstream browser lets you block or delete cookies, refuse third-party cookies, or open a private window that discards everything at the end of the session. The controls sit under Settings and then Privacy in Chrome, Preferences and then Privacy in Safari and Firefox, and Cookies and site permissions in Edge.
Blocking all cookies, including strictly necessary ones, will break parts of many websites, not only this one. A more practical approach is to allow essential cookies, refuse analytics, and clear stored data periodically.
- Chrome: Settings, Privacy and security, Third-party cookies and Delete browsing data
- Safari: Settings, Privacy, Block all cookies or Manage website data
- Firefox: Settings, Privacy and Security, Cookies and Site Data
- Edge: Settings, Cookies and site permissions, Manage and delete cookies
- Mobile browsers: the same options appear under Settings within the browser app
9. Do Not Track and global privacy signals
Browsers can send a signal asking sites not to track you. There is no single agreed standard for how sites should respond, so we take the practical approach of keeping non-essential cookies to a minimum and not using cross-site advertising trackers in the first place.
10. How this policy relates to our other policies
Cookies are only one part of the picture. Our Privacy Policy explains the personal data we hold to quote, book and clear shipments, who it is shared with and how long it is kept. Our Terms and Conditions govern the booking itself, including payment in full at booking and refunds within 3 to 14 working days.
If you would like to know exactly which cookies were set during a visit, your browser can list them for this site under its privacy settings, and the freight desk will answer questions about anything you find there.