A move to bring down container handling charges at the International Container Transshipment Terminal here through direct billing of export-import trade and coastal cargo operators has been put off to February.
Cochin Port Trust had announced that container handling charges would come down from the New Year Day with the introduction of the new billing system. However, sources said on Wednesday that the new system would be introduced only in February.
The announcement by the Port Trust in October said that the shipping companies now paid charges to DP World and that exporters and importers were then billed with “add-on charges relating to their own services”. The Port Trust said this resulted in service tax being incurred twice as well as in some disputes over charges.
The Port authority had said that all shipping line related service would be charged directly to the export-import business by the shipping lines and that IGTL and shipping lines would work out the modalities for the new system by January 1.
Meanwhile, steamer agents have criticised the latest hike in container handling charges at the terminal here. The terminal operator has announced a 3.48 per cent hike in container handling charges. The higher cost of container handling will hit both exim trade and coastal containers, said Prakash Aiyer, president of Cochin Steamer Agents’ Association.
He said that the latest hike in handling charges meant that exim trade and coastal business would pay an extra Rs. 3 crore a year in handling charges alone.
He said traders handling reefer containers would be the badly hit by the rise in charges.
