Foreign shipping lines collect nearly ten types of surcharges.

The Vietnam Association of Shipping Agents, Brokers and Services (Visaba) has just sent a document to the Prime Minister and ministries and branches on strengthening the management of surcharges of foreign shipping lines.

According to Visaba, currently, Vietnam's current legal regulations have been creating favorable conditions for foreign shipping lines to trade and operate at the country's ports.

However, the current operation of foreign shipping lines in Vietnam has significantly affected the interests of import-export enterprises, seaports, logistics and state management.

Foreign shipping lines are collecting about 10 types of surcharges on goods at seaports (such as THC surcharges, document surcharges, fuel surcharges, container cleaning surcharges, etc.) (Illustration photo).

Visaba said that nearly 100% of Vietnam's import and export output is currently handled by foreign shipping lines. Foreign shipping lines entering and leaving ports and opening routes do not need to report because current Vietnamese law does not have regulations on registration and management of transport routes.

Notably, shipping lines are collecting about 10 types of surcharges on goods at seaports (such as THC surcharges, document surcharges, fuel surcharges, container cleaning surcharges, etc.).

However, the price and these surcharges are decided by the shipping company without any agreement with the customer.

This forces Vietnamese shippers to accept in order to get the goods because Vietnamese shippers are not the ones negotiating and signing the transportation contract.

Since the beginning of 2024, foreign shipping lines have continuously announced an increase of 10-20% in THC fees for each type of container service.

Meanwhile, shipping lines that want to adjust fees and surcharges only need to list price changes 15 days before the price adjustment date and do not have to go through inspection or explanation of the elements constituting fees and surcharges (according to Decree 146/2016 on listing prices and surcharges outside the price of container shipping services by sea and service prices at seaports).

In addition, foreign shipping lines have been asking depots for very strong discounts, up to 50-60% of lifting and lowering prices, while this fee is not related to shipping lines.

Visaba affirmed that Vietnam is an important market for foreign shipping lines with 25 million Teus passing through Vietnamese seaports, including about 15 million containers of import and export goods. On average, a shipping line's surcharge is 200 USD/container, so every year, Vietnam lacks control of about 3 billion USD.

"This increases logistics costs and reduces the competitiveness of Vietnamese goods with other countries," said a Visaba representative.

From here, the association proposes to add surcharges outside the price of container shipping services by sea to the list of goods and services subject to price declaration to perfect the mechanism for managing prices and surcharges for goods at seaports.

This is to avoid the case where shipping lines arbitrarily increase prices and overcharge, affecting the interests of cargo owners. In case of super-profitable surcharges, special consumption tax must be applied.

Source: https://www.baogiaothong.vn/hang-tau-nuoc-ngoai-thu-gan-chuc-loai-phu-phi-192240202171615926.htm