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Maersk Spot restricts NAC booking, opportunities for small forwarding companies to have more customers

 

Sean Crook, director of Sydney-based forwarding company Neolink, said Maersk and its subsidiary Hamburg Süd "definitely been pushing everyone to online bookings and/or FAK [freight all kinds] rates".

“But I would say that is 95% of the market now,” he told The Loadstar.

"And while this may not be good for large exporters/importers of 1,000 teu a year, our 300-500 teu customers do not have a contract price [should unaffected]".

"In many cases, we have found contract rates for our named NAC (named account) accounts to be less reliable [for bookings] than FAK spot rates. I usually give my customers both options and ask them to pay a premium fee to ensure availability and increase shipping reliability".

“I see this as a big opportunity to win market share from the big multinationals as they will be losing work to us and not being transparent with their customers that FAK/spot rates are the better option."

For example, a customer might see a significant improvement in on-time delivery percentage and reductions in product drop-offs when not booking under contracts, he said.

“Our customer numbers have increased by over 100 regular importers in the past 12 months, mainly from multinationals not being transparent about this very issue,” he added.

“Why do shipping lines want to continue to book containers at my NAC contract rate from China, when they can sell the same space for 2.5 times my price?"

“Maersk / Hamburg Süd is just doing what the others are doing. They are not refusing to deal with freight forwarders, they are just giving up NAC rates when demand is so high and they can make more profit by switching to FAK rates.”

However, not all forwarders are happy with the limited availability of the Maersk Spot platform and are questioning whether the change will become permanent. One said: “I think they have a small window to make this work, and I would not back them to do it. I expect they will be looking for freight again by the end of next year.”

 

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Source: Phaata.com (According to The Loadstar)

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