Garuda air cargo handling

On Dec. 23, 2002, we had a shipment of two boxes containing 16 pots of poinsettia plants destined for Semarang. The boxes were specifically designed and manufactured for shipping potted plants or flowers of this particular size, and the plants inside the boxes were wrapped in heavy Samson paper sleeves, specifically made and designed to package such plants for shipping.

On the address labels were written Jangan dibalik (Do not turn upside down) and the boxes were printed with arrows to indicate their upright position. The Surat Muatan Udara (SMU), or the air cargo invoice, of this particular shipment was No. 126-6640051-5, and we were charged with and paid the 125 percent perishable cargo rate.

Normal handling would not have damaged the plants. The only way the plants could have been damaged was if the boxes were thrown from one handler to another, and/or were dropped. This is very possible, because our plants are grown in a mixture of loose peat. As you can guess already, five of the 16 pots were crushed.

Because the plants are relatively light, they almost always get charged by volume weight, and a whopping Rp 112,219 for 94.5 kg was charged for an actual weight of 48 kg, plus other administrative and storage charges, not including the cost from Bogor to Cengkareng.

We reported the incident to Garuda in Cengkareng, and were informed that the consignee in Semarang contact Garuda there, and that Garuda would pay damages. The consignee had taken photos of the crushed plants/flowers immediately after opening the boxes, but afterwards cut the flowers off the damaged plants in an effort to save the beautiful part of the plants. He took the photos to Garuda in Semarang, but to no avail. Garuda blamed the damage on the packaging.

We have shipped much bigger quantities of the same plants to Surabaya, Yogyakarta, Bali and Singapore previously, and would have lost many plants if our packaging was faulty.

The crux of the matter is that although Garuda had charged higher rates for perishable cargo, it did not handle the cargo accordingly, and did not want to take responsibility when things went wrong as a result.

BENNY TJIA, Bogor, West Java