Parsippany, N.J.—July 17, 2012—Global ocean shipping ecommerce network provider INTTRA and SeaIntel, a container shipping market analysis provider, released a shipping reliability report that combines on-time performance with schedule reliability measures. Now, shipping decision-makers have timely access to standard performance measurements at the vessel- and container-level, creating unprecedented visibility into actual shipping performance. With an 81 percent global schedule reliability average, previously available measurements enabled the industry to identify only vessel performance. The addition of on-time performance metrics at a level meaningful to the shipper provides actionable data for carriers and their customers.
Gaps exist between vessel arrival and delivery reliability
With an average of 900,000 to 1,000,000 container status messages processed daily supporting transactions that represent over 18 percent of the world’s total container shipments, INTTRA’s data provides visibility into the most comprehensive on-time performance measurements. The results of trade lane analysis, which compared vessel arrival reliability based on SeaIntel’s measurements with the actual container delivery reliability based on INTTRA’s data, identified a significant gap between these performance measures.
“For the first time shippers can now analyze actual container delivery time versus vessel arrival time on a country-by-country level,” said Lars Jensen, Chief Executive Officer, SeaIntel Maritime. “This is a game-changer in how shippers can evaluate carrier performance and make more informed decisions on how their freight is moved. While knowing when the vessel arrives is an indicator of on-time arrival, what’s most important to a shipper is how timely their cargo is moving. With this report, shippers now have timely information, at a level of detail that makes it actionable.”
The Asia-to-Europe and Asia-to-North America trades are both characterized by the container delivery being eight-to-10 percentage points lower than the vessel reliability. However, the highest variability is seen from Europe to Australia/New Zealand where vessel reliability on the direct service is 88 percent, but container delivery is only 36 percent, a variance of 52 percentage points.
“The tendency is to look exclusively at the carriers when discussing shipping performance reliability,” said Ken Bloom, Chief Executive Officer, INTTRA. “The information captured through INTTRA enhances performance conversations and can be used to identify more precisely where improvements may need to be made. We hope that by providing the industry with consistent, easily accessible and reliable performance information, we will be able to solve reliability challenges and begin to work on other industry improvements.”
On-time delivery metrics provide optics into improved trade lane performance
The report findings also indicate positive improvements in overall on-time performance for the ocean shipping industry. Global on-time delivery in June improved to 64 percent from 61 percent in May. Asia to Europe on-time delivery rose from 65 percent in 2011 to 74 percent in 2012. During that same period, in the Asia to Mediterranean trade, performance increased from 46 percent in 2011 to 68 percent in 2012.
The analysis of the on-time delivery on the direct services from China to various European countries revealed a strong correlation in the number of direct services and on-time performance. In markets where there are more direct services the performance in on-time container delivery for all participants is higher.
“For the carriers, having access to this insight provides an immediate benefit by enabling them to see performance information from the perspective of the customer and to leverage it to continue to improve service delivery,” continued Bloom. “As reliability improves, not only can the carriers improve their service but they should also see a reduction in their operating costs. More reliability means less exception handling, less rework and lower costs for the carriers as well—carriers and their customers both benefit.”
INTTRA users will have access to the on-time performance for their shipments including performance metrics for each of their carrier partners. Carriers will see their performance with a specific customer and their ranking among other carriers, however, the specific identity of the other carriers is not revealed. This actionable performance information is available to all INTTRA users through OceanMetrics, a new product rolling out to carriers now and available to shippers this fall.
For the full report, visit www.seaintel.com.
