Port Update + New China-Australia Service

Patricks PONDUS Weighing Fees:

Partick’s Terminal in Brisbane port have for the past year been using the PONDUS weighing system to check-weigh import and export containers against the declared weights on import and export documentation.

Importers and exporters found to be under/over declaring weight by more than 1,000kgs have been receiving a “weight Amendment Fee” from the terminal, collected from the trucking company delivering or collecting the container.

The same system was expanded to Patrick’s Melbourne Terminal in October 2021 and has now been introduced into Patrick’s Sydney Terminal from early February, 2022 so we remind importers and exporters that it is extremely important that declare weights be accurate on all import/export documentation.

It is understood the fee will be around $ 250-00 to $ 260.00 +GST on any container found to be +/- 1,000kgs on the documented declared weight.

 

New China-Australia Service:

PIL Lines, Yang Ming Shipping, TS Lines and Sea Lead Shipping will introduce a new direct weekly service from China and Taiwan to Australia with first vessel sailing from Qingdao on 10th March, 2022.

Port rotation will be Qingdao –Shanghai – Shekou – Kaohsiung – Melbourne – Sydney – Brisbane – Qingdao and will be serviced by a fleet of six (6) 3,500 – 3,900 TUE (twenty foot equivalent unit) vessels.

It is hoped the addition of the new service with more capacity on the trade route may assist in seeing a reduction in costs from other carriers.

Svitzer Tugs – Protected Industrial Action

Svitzer Tugs – Protected Industrial Action – Update #1

In the latest industrial unrest and delays to beset the Australian waterfront, tug masters employed by Svitzer Australia (represented by the Australian Maritime Officers Union (AMOU)) are undertaking extensive Protected Industrial Action (PIA) across many ports in Australia.

From a container shipping perspective, these strike actions are impacting on vessel arrivals and departures in Port Botany, Brisbane and Fremantle. Thankfully, Melbourne has been spared (at this point in time).

The current notified PIAs in Australian container ports are:

Port Botany:

  • 48-hour stoppage from 00:01 on 17 February to 00:01 on 19 February
  • 48-hour stoppage from 00:01 on 22 to 00:01 on 24 February

 

Brisbane:

  • 48-hour stoppage from 0600 on 17 February to 0600 on 19 February
  • 72-hour stoppage from 0600 on 22 February to 0600 on 25 February

Fremantle:

  • 48-hour stoppage from 0700 on 24 February to 0700 on 19 February
  • 48-hour stoppage from 0700 on 3 March to 0700 on 5 March
  • A ban on employees performing recall and relief work during a period of leave for an unlimited duration from 0700 on 18 February

 

As a result of these strike actions, berthing delays in the impacted ports will deteriorate even further from the current delays caused by significant vessel off-window arrivals, vessel bunching, COVID-related labour absenteeism in container terminals, and other factors.

Container terminals are already informing landside stakeholders of changes to scheduled vessel arrivals impacting on projected import container availability dates, and export receival timeframes.

Some shipping lines have also notified vessel port rotations to try to avoid the worst of the berthing delays.

While Melbourne hasn’t been targeted for strike actions yet, the rotation of some vessels to Melbourne ahead of Sydney (or Brisbane) will add further berthing pressures in Melbourne. It will also contribute further to Melbourne’s very congested landside container logistics chain where:

 

  • Transport operators’ yards are well over-capacity
  • COVID-related labour absenteeism in all sectors of the chain has contributed to logistics delays
  • Container dwell times are increasing
  • Major road works are extending truck travel times tremendously, leading to very negative impacts on truck productivity
  • There are strains in managing empty container de-hires as well.

 

CTAA understands that Svitzer has applied to the Fair Work Commission (FWC) for the Protected Industrial Action (PIA) to be suspended or terminated on economic grounds. A hearing on the matter in the FWC in Sydney is set down for 10m tomorrow (Friday, 18 February 2022).

The background to the dispute is that Svitzer has been negotiating with the three maritime unions with coverage in the tug sector on the terms of a new Enterprise Agreement (EA) since before the existing EA lapsed in 2019.

Then, in January this year, Svitzer applied to the FWC for the existing EA to be terminated, which if endorsed by the FWC would result in the pay and conditions of employees reverting to those contained in the Marine Towage Award 2020.

This dispute comes at a most inopportune time as the container shipping and associated landside logistics chain are under unprecedented strain. We hope that the Protected Industrial Action is either withdrawn, suspended or terminated, and that the parties continue at the negotiation table to reach agreement on new EA conditions.

Regards,

Neil Chambers, Director
Container Transport Alliance Australia (CTAA)

 Addition of China to the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug (BMSB) Emerging Risk Country list

China has been selected as Emerging Country for BMSB

Increased BMSB Seals In Tact inspections for FCL/FCX containers being imported from China with below HS Codes

  • Goods tariffed as Chapters 39, 68, 69, 70, 73, 84, 85 and 89.

 

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Who does this notice affect?

Importers, freight forwarders, customs brokers,

Addition of China to the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug (BMSB) Emerging Risk Country list

 

Bio Security

Freight & Trade Alliance (FTA) wish to advise that the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment (the department) has recently issued Import Industry Advice Notice 20-2022 advising of the Addition of China to the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug (BMSB) Emerging Risk Country list

Initial FTA/APSA enquiries indicate there will be no additional impost on industry as the department will vary current BMSB verification activities and redirect resources to conduct verifications on Chinese origin goods.

Its expected that no additional resources will be required by the department to conduct the new inspections and delays should therefore be minimized.

 

What has changed?

As a result of detections of live BMSB in some containerized commodities originating in China, the department will be adding China as an emerging risk country for the remainder of the 2021-22 BMSB season.

The increased random inspection activities will apply to the following goods:

  • Goods manufactured in, or shipped from China and,
  • FCL / FCX containers – for goods shipped in sealed 6 hard sided containers and,
  • Goods tariffed as Chapters 39, 68, 69, 70, 73, 84, 85 and 89.

LCL / FAK containers and break bulk goods (including those shipped on flat rack or in open top containers) are out of scope for increased inspection activities.

In scope containers, as identified above, will be selected at random and will be directed for an ‘Inspection – Seals Intact Inspection’ at a Class 1.1, 1.3, 2.1 or 2.2 Approved Arrangement.



Further information

GPSM Customs Team and our Customer service Staff will be pleased to provide you with any further information required.

Copyright © 2022 Freight & Trade Alliance (FTA) Pty Ltd, All rights reserved.

 

LCL Booking Fees and Port Charges

LCL Booking Fees:

LCL container depots in Australia are introducing Vehicle Booking Fees for all LCL shipments in a trend that started some 6 months ago.

Initially only a couple of facilities commenced charging this costs but now more and more operators around the country have introduced these new arrangements similar to port FCL timeslot Booking fees.

Due to our increased costs, which we have absorbed in the past, we have no alternative but to pass these costs on from 14th February, 2022.

The cost will be $ 20.00 per shipment and this cost will be added to our Communicator portal.

 

LCL Port Charges:

Our port charges on LCL shipments have remained in place for quite some time, despite several rate increases by shipping lines.

Our consolidation partners have advised that our agreed rates will now be increased by $ 5.00 per cbm/1000kgs effective from 14th February, 2022.

We regret the need to increase these costs but we have no alternative given all shipping lines again increased FCL port charges from 1st February, 2022.

The new cost of $ 95.00 per cbm/1000kgs is still one of the lowest in the market and will be added to our Communicator portal.

USA Shipping Situation

Many clients will be aware of the struggle to find space on the USA to Australia/New Zealand trade at present .

Recent weather events including a heavy snow storm that has swept across the country from the Gulf all the way to the north east corner of USA has hampered pick-ups and deliveries of FCL and LCL shipments since late last week.

Not only have many of the USA East Coast ports and rail systems have been affected by snow drifts and huge traffic delays, a large number of truckers have had to close as well.

Below is a map showing the trucking terminal closures (the red and yellow dots) as a result of icy and snow affected roads being unsafe to drive on. This adds to the existing issues of equipment and driver shortages throughout the industry.

FCL bookings are extremely difficult to obtain since Maersk Line changed their direct service to a transshipment service over Asia.

Masrk were vessel sharing with their associated company Hamburg-SUD on a weekly basis so effectively the USA-ANZ direct services has lost capacity of some 12,000-14000 container slots per week.

The remaining direct carriers, CMA, MSC and Hapag-Lloyd are all overbooked and bookings are now being put out to 6-8 weeks delay as a result of the shortage of space and the continuing unprecented volume of containers moving on the trade lane.

The other transshipment carrers to ANZ over Asia, including YML, Evergreen, COSCO and OOCL are seeing huge volumes still existing on that service despite the closure of factories in Asia for Chinese New Year, however we are now seeing a trickle of bookings to ANZ now being offered by these carriers since they shut down all bookings to ANZ prior to Xmas 2021.

Patrick’s EBA Dispute Settled

Finally some good news from the Australian waterfront.

This morning we have been advised that the Enterprise Bargaining Agreement between Patrick’s Terminal in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Fremantle and the Maritime Union of Australia appears to finally have been negotiated.

Below is the statement issued by Patrick’s Terminals:

“Patrick Terminals can confirm that an in-principle agreement has been reached with the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) for a new 4-year enterprise agreement. The agreement will now need to be voted on by the MUA members before being ratified by the Fair Work Commission.

Patrick Terminals is very pleased with the outcome. The new agreement has achieved the removal of restrictive recruitment conditions and also delivered other much-needed flexibilities for the Patrick operations across all four terminals. Patrick Terminals looks forward to the endorsement of the agreement by the MUA members and four years of industrial stability on our waterfront.

The current vessel berthing delays at Patrick’s Terminals around the coast have been:

  • Melbourne – severe congestion and delays up to 10+ days
  • Sydney – average delay is around 2.5 days
  • Brisbane – some vessel bunching, but overall there is no major delays until early February
  • Fremantle – berth free (last week), but vessels starting to bunch again from (the weekend just gone)

It is hoped that the new Enterprise Agreement (when ratified) will be a contributing factor to Patrick Terminals recovering from the current berthing delays and flow-on impacts that these delays have on landside logistics performance”.

National Rail Services

Following extensive flooding in South Australia and Western Australia, Pacific National who operate rail services between Australia’s East and West Coasts, have advised that some 400kms of railway rack needs to be replaced on the cross country services.

This has severely disrupted all services and could be some time before the rail line is again open to service.

For those clients affected by the service outage, GPSM are pursuing enquiries with coastal sea operators to try and find a solution to the current delays.

Our team will keep individual clients updated as soon as possible.

Current Australian Port Status

Below is the current status of average vessel delays and berthing times around Australia this week:

  • The delays indicated below are for this week’s vessels only and can change frequently depending on labor absenteeism / Covid related delays, final productivity at the terminal and weather.
  • DPW Melbourne, Sydney & Brisbane continue to face congestion and delays due to all services arriving late and clashing caused by weather impacts overseas and recent local weather.
  • Due to increased COVID testing and isolation requirements terminals are facing labor shortages which is impacting vessel operations.
  • DPW Fremantle facing extensive delays of up to 2 days due to vessel bunching.
  • Patrick Fremantle facing ~ 2 days of delays due to vessel bunching.
  • Patrick Melbourne is facing severe congestion and delays of 10 – 12 days due to vessel bunching & COVID related labor shortages.
  • Hutchison Sydney experiencing congestion (Approx. 3 days) due to all services arriving late and bunching and weather.
  • Average delays at VICT now approximately 3 – 4 days .
  • Due to upsurge in Covid testing & Positive cases DPW Sydney now experiencing 10 days delays to vessels berthing.
  • DPW are currently facing ~c10% reduction in the workforce daily.
  • Patrick Terminals operation at 50% capacity .
  • NSW ( ~ 30,000) and Victoria (~ 23,000) are recording large amounts of COVID positive cases daily.
  • Brisbane (~ 18,000) is also beginning to feel the effect of a surge in Positive COVID cases.
  • This is putting immense pressure on labor procurement and additional delays are now being experienced.
  • Terminals are continually remapping schedules to take into account these latest figures.

Chinese New Year Holidays 2022

Just a reminder that Chinese New Year holidays will commence from 31st January, 2022 until 6th February, 2022 and we ask all clients to ensure they receive shipment documents from suppliers in advance of the break.

Many factories will close for longer periods as most workers will return to their home towns during the holidays.

Trucking services across China are already struggling to cope with the volume of cargo and containers as factories try to move as many orders as possible prior to the holiday period.