Higher volumes of damaged cargo a worrying trend

Higher volumes of LCL rather than FCL cargo is clearly the trend in the current recessive economic climate, but with it comes another worrying trend – an increase in volumes of damaged cargo, says Cargocare Freight Services’ Sue Wood. “The LCL market is doing well because more people are bringing in smaller quantities more often. “But because of the move away from FCLs, a number of co-loaders are co-loading with other consolidators which means you could end up with two or three co-loaders all as part of one container shipment. And when co-loaders can’t find enough cargo to fill the container, you then end up with half empty containers which leads to higher quantities of damaged cargo than ever before.” The result is that shippers who are not moving particularly vulnerable cargo and who have never had claims before are now facing this additional burden. “We hand-pick our co-loaders, which is why until now we’ve had a very clean record in terms of damages as far as risk control is concerned. But because of market trends there’s little we can do about it.” Wood’s reading of the market is very much in tune with industry consensus. “Despite the trend to LCL cargo, volumes are definitely down – not only in terms of the number of shipments but in terms of contents. “Tonnage is probably down by 50% but the actual number of shipments is only down by 20%. People are still bringing in cargo but they’re bringing in a lot less – and that’s across the board.” According to Wood, Cargocare doesn’t have a lot of exposure to retail, which was by design rather than by accident. “We’ve got some very specific cargo coming from the Far East and those volumes seem to be maintaining, but that only accounts for about 50% of cargo from the region – the other 50% is down significantly.” And while the market outlook for now remains flat, Wood says that keeping up staff morale is a key focus. “We’re doing loads of training and are preparing ourselves for the imminent implementation of Part 108 security regulations. “Sales activity continues apace. Like other players, we are hungry to fill some of the gaps that have developed over the last few months, but we are confident that this will begin to bear fruit very shortly.”