Importers unhappy with free storage time cut

JAKARTA (JP): Importers are unhappy with the government's decision to cut the time containers can be stored for free at the city's Tanjung Priok port, from five days to three days, but a local shipping line welcomes it.

Chairman of the Indonesian Importers Association, Amirudin Saud, said yesterday that costs to importers would increase, but the port's container pile-up would not be reduced under the plan.

"Although the government has decided to cut free container waiting time, most importers will not be able to clear their goods within the set time," Amirudin said.

Minister of Transportations Haryanto Dhanutirto announced Tuesday that the government would cut the time importers could store their containers free of charge at the port from five days to three days, effective Aug. 1.

The minister said it had to be done to reduce the container pile-up at the port.

Local shipping firm PT Samudera Indonesia welcomed the government's decision, saying it would force importers to clear their consignments quickly, and reduce the pile-up.

"The decree is very positive. Importers will have no reason to be lazy about processing their consignments," Samudera Indonesia's president Soedarpo Sastrosatomo was quoted by Antara as saying yesterday.

Soedarpo said the planned time cut, to be enforced by the transportation minister, would improve the port's container unloading performance.

He said that if the port's unloading activities slowed because of a container pile-up, it could increase vessels' waiting time, and create congestion.

State-owned PT Pelindo II, which overseas Tanjung Priok port, recorded that 60,000 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) were unloaded at the port in May, an increase over 54,000 TEUs in April.

But only 32,000 TEUs were picked up by importers in May and 31,000 TEUs in April.

This caused the pile-up at the port. To alleviate the problem, Pelindo and the customs office arbitrarily removed a significant number of containers a day to privately run terminals, at importers' expense, because they said the importers caused the problem.

Soedarpo echoed the government's accusatory call, saying importers were lazy about processing their consignments because they had five free days to clear them from the port.

"If importers clear their goods quickly, they make way for shipping lines to unload their goods," Soedarpo said.

Anton J. Supit of the Indonesian Footwear Association has said that no industrial importer wanted to delay picking up its goods from the port.

He blamed prolonged bureaucratic procedures for the slow clearing of goods from the port by importers.

Amirudin said most importers needed at least four days just to process their documents. These included forms for banking, shipping lines, customs and Pelindo.

Amirudin said that if the bank at which importers had opened a letter of credit was not linked to the custom's electronic data interchange, it could take even longer.

He also complained about the government's arbitrary removal of containers to private terminals as it added to importers costs.

Private container yards charge high fees, about Rp 500,000 (US$205) per 40-foot container per day.

Amirudin said he suspected Pelindo II employees had colluded with private container terminal operators when it had consignments removed to private terminals.

He said the government seemed to have turned a deaf ear to importers' complains with its decision to cut the free storage time. (rid)