Saf fires legal salvo over bogus website

Another ghost shipping line with a strong SA connection has been launched on the internet, and legal action is being taken in dealing with suspected fraud. Safmarine, the AP Moller group subsidiary, is aiming legal depth charges at a Cameroon-based bogus website called Safmarine Shipping Line SA – to currently be found under the web address, www. safmarineshippingline.com “Reports have come in from our Portuguese and Cameroon colleagues of a fraud involving a fake company calling itself Safmarine Shipping Lines SA,” said a spokesman for the genuine Safmarine. The fake company has been sending chain messages out to importers regarding shipments, and producing bogus bills of lading, proforma invoices, certificate of origin notices, phyto-sanitary certificates, etc.” Antwerp-based Safmarine PR and communications executive, Victor Shieh, said that the line’s corporate legal department was handling the matter with the appropriate authorities. This type of spurious web page has been called the “Nigerian letter on the web”, – selling false promises for money. They usually accompany these bogus bills of lading and pro-forma invoices – which, like the banking letter scams which frequently appear in people’s e-mail in-trays, are intended to persuade the unsuspecting corporates that are targeted to part with money for payment of these phoney bills. But, so far, Safmarine has received no reports of customers losing money, according to London’s Containerisation International. In checking this report, FTW called up a copy of the website. It’s not too likely to fool those in the SA shipping trade. They should be wise to wrong pictures (vessels belonging to other lines, and a luxury passenger liner, for example). They would also be alerted by strange claims, like: “We’re the global leader in air freight, carrying 12% of the total worldwide market, more than twice as much as the second biggest organisation. Our operations are managed from over 150 countries, providing a personalised service to and from all key markets.” But for shippers who are not too maritime oriented, it’s probably quite convincing. It’s all very similar to the ghost line sailing the SA seas last year, a swindle which FTW was able to reveal to the affected parties, Grindrod, its subsidiary Unicorn Shipping, and its bulk shipping subsidiary, Island View Shipping (IVS). This false line, trading under the name South African Line (SAL) was touting a bulk operator’s function on its website that no-one had ever heard of, but which claimed to be Southern Africa’s largest bulk shipping operator, shipping between 15 and 18 million tons per annum globally.