Maersk considers moving imports function to CT

Maersk Line is proposing moving its imports function from Durban to Cape Town in the near future, national customer service manager Vicki Erskine told FTW. But this is still only a proposal, she said. “There is a staff consultation process that needs to be followed and that will be under way as our project unfolds. This is not a recommendation that we have taken lightly and acknowledge that many large customers are based in Durban,” she said. “What we have seen through our centralised setup is that our people, processes and systems are able to make remote interaction with our customers possible via telephone, e-mail and e-commerce systems. We will continue to complement this with face-to-face interactions where deemed important by our customers. “The primary reason for proposing positioning our import and export teams under one roof is that we can achieve economies of scale, in addition to best practice sharing through cross-skilling between the customer service departments,” she said. In the meantime, Erskine said, a comprehensive training and hand-over programme would be implemented to minimise any disruptions to customers during the change process. “We are still a couple of months away from completing our detailed implementation plan, but will definitely keep our customers updated through advisories and feedback,” she said.