The optimum combination of delivery, risk transfer, and cost transfer points in international trade with emphasis on Incoterms 2020

The purpose of this research is to investigate how to overcome the challenges in the use of Incoterms and design a solution to optimize the use of Incoterms standards concerning supply chain management and relations between buyers and sellers in order to create favorable conditions for Companies in international transactions, especially regarding the points of delivery of goods, transfer of risk and transfer of costs.This research is designed with a mixed method and in five stages, including the grounded theory method, Delphi technique, the Cross Impact Analysis Method, overlap, and Identifying compatible scenarios. The sampling method was purposeful.In the first stage, 7 effective factors, 13 components, 11 strategies, and two consequences were identified by using MAXQDA 20 software. In the second stage, 33 effective factors were identified during the four stages of the Delphi interview technique. In the third stage, using MicMac software, five strategic factors were identified. In the fourth stage, the factors of buyer and seller duties in Incoterms 2020, buyer-seller relations, supply chain management, and international trade were selected as drivers. Then six compatible scenarios were extracted using Scenario Wizard software. The findings of this research showed that if the level of the relationship between the buyer and the seller is high and to meet the goals of supply chain management, including improving processes, minimizing costs, and maximizing efficiency, and in the export approach, the use of Group D of Incoterms and in the import approach, using group E of Incoterms is the Optimal combination.