Leonard Neill ENTERING AN agreement with a charter vessel operator is unsafe unless the shipper has an intimate knowledge of the operator’s business status and is confident his goods will reach their destination, says Captain Muku Mukundan, a world authority on maritime fraud who addressed the business community in South Africa last week. “The freighter you have chartered to deliver sugar worth US$5 million, for example, may fail to arrive. The question then arises: has your cargo been diverted to another port, has the ship sunk or has it been seized by pirates. “There is another scenario which must be remembered if the vessel owner is unknown to you. He may be running on a shoe-string and finds himself locked in a port where his finance has run out, the vessel is seized and your cargo goes along with the vessel to the successful bidder at the resulting auction. “There are many devious so-called charter vessel operators around the world. The vessel takes off having been paid to deliver but may run into engine problems in an unscheduled port. The owner cannot meet the costs and loses both vessel and cargo. There are also plenty out there ready to defraud the consignee of the goods. “There are big names in business worldwide that have been caught in this way. They don’t reveal the fact openly, not wanting the unpleasant publicity. But they are the losers and the contracted buyer never gets his goods, which are either sold off to defray expenses at an auction or are sold by the vessel operator to another party. This type of fraud is prevalent.”
