Kelly handles the full suite of commercial disputes, with a particular focus on international trade and shipping matters. His expertise covers charterparty and bills of lading disputes, shipbuilding disputes, crew claims, cargo claims, marine casualties involving collisions, groundings, fires, loss of life and salvage, bunker disputes, marine insurance, international trade, letters of credit disputes, freight forwarding disputes and ship chandler claims. He acts for traders in all manner of disputes involving quality, shortage, and cargo damage claims.

Kelly also acts for clients in commercial litigation and arbitration proceedings. He has represented companies, shareholders, directors, and creditors in Court proceedings involving shareholders’ disputes, fraud as well as breaches of directors’ fiduciary duties.

Due to the nature of his practice, Kelly is regularly instructed to obtain freezing and mandatory injunctions on an urgent basis. He also frequently deals with ship arrests, whether for the arresting party or for the owner of the arrested ship. Kelly is a member of the Board as well as a member of the Editorial Committee of Shiparrested.com, which is an international network of shipping lawyers who specialise in maritime law and in ship arrests.

Kelly was in the first batch of shipping lawyers in Singapore to be recognised by the Singapore Academy of Law as a Senior Accredited Specialist in Maritime & Shipping Law. He is a Fellow of the Singapore Institute of Arbitrators and an Associate Mediator with the Singapore Mediation Centre. Kelly is also the editor for the chapter on The High Court (Admiralty Jurisdiction) Act in Singapore Civil Procedure which is published annually. This is the leading textbook for legal practitioners in Singapore on civil procedure.

Chambers Global & Asia Pacific Legal 500 ranks Kelly as a top tier lawyer for Shipping Litigation and hails him as “tenacious”, “takes a very thorough approach and is excellent on detail” and for being “aggressive for his clients and will make his point”. Asia Pacific Legal 500 commended him for providing “very practical advice” and as one who is “responsive and able to understand the complexity of a matter and map it out in a simple and understandable format”. He is also recommended as a Distinguished Practitioner for his work in Dispute Resolution & Litigation by Asialaw Leading Lawyers and as a Litigation Star for his work in Commercial & Transactions and Shipping by Benchmark Litigation Asia Pacific. Kelly is also regarded as a Thought Leader in the field of Transport by Who’s Who Legal.