Navis will be rolled out at the Kaserne terminal in Gauteng on completion of the civil works currently under way at the terminal, according to Transnet Freight Rail (TFR). This follows complaints by forwarding and clearing agents that there is no update on containers being released from the terminal because it is not on the Navis system. TFR spokesman Mike Asefovitz said Transnet acknowledged industry’s desire to have Navis extended to Kaserne and other inland terminals, but due to the civil works currently in progress at the terminal the decision was taken to roll out Navis only on completion of this work. He said, however, that there was a rail export preadvice process which had been in place since the first implementation of Navis at the port facilities. “The process allows for automated pre-advice of rail containers from any of the inland rail facilities which are not yet using the Navis system. When an export train departs the inland rail terminal, the containers are pre-advised via a system interface between our “old” terminal operating system and the Navis system,” he said. “However, we do sometimes experience problems in the event of a human error in capturing. We have therefore put in place a process whereby we proactively check the pre-advice status of exports inbound to the ports whilst the train is en-route so as to address any pre-advice or other process deviations prior to arrival at the port.”
