Liner schedule reliability data continues to show the Gemini Cooperation achieving the highest on-time vessel arrival performance – although it is beginning to trend downwards.
According to the eeSea liner database, which has begun to publish on-time arrival performance on a weekly basis, across all trades the Gemini partners Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, hit an on-time arrival rate of 86% for the first quarter of this year, way ahead of the other vessel sharing agreements (VSAs).
According to the analyst, the Premier Alliance – including MSC as an outside ‘partner’ – came in second, with a 31% on-time arrival average during the first quarter, followed by the Ocean Alliance at 25%, MSC outside its Premier Alliance participation, at 22%, while independent services outside the alliance structure collectively had an on-time arrival rate of 30% on east-west services, including the burgeoning Middle East trades.
Interestingly, eeSea also noted a variation between the Gemini partners’ vessels operated within the VSA, with Maersk’s ships achieving an 84% on-time arrival and Hapag’s hitting 90%.
“That may have to do with the number of contributed vessels (approximately two-thirds by Maersk) and the tradelane assignments (Maersk is long on the shuttles, for example); but for now, the bragging rights sit in Hamburg,” the analyst said.
However, the data also showed a gradual decline in reliability by all carriers and VSAs during Q1, which appears to have continued into the second quarter, with early data for week 16 showing Gemini on-time arrivals falling to 76%.
The bedding-in of the new networks is still very under way, of course, and much of the data is focused on headhaul movements.
Meanwhile, anecdotal evidence from some European forwarders suggests that on the backhaul trade, the new discipline around vessel departure times was leading some Far East-destined containers being rolled, as terminals didn’t have enough time to load the vessel before its departure.
Meanwhile, there have been questions raised about the capacity of Asian feeder networks to sustain Gemini’s focus on only calling at the largest hubs.
One forwarder said they were repeatedly unable to load containers onto feeder vessels in Asia, due to space limitations.
“Currently feeder space to destinations is being restricted. Carriers claim this is due to vessels being full to onward destinations in South-east Asia, but potentially this could be down to congestion in Pelepas and Singapore,” they said, clarifying that these were not the shuttle routes Gemini uses to connect to its main South-east Asian hub at Tanjung Pelepas, but the regional feeder services offered by Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd outside the scope of Gemini, and either operated independently or in cooperation with third-party carriers.
