The “Twin Star Alliance” plan aims to increase liner schedule reliability to over 80%, a move that has drawn industry attention. But can liner companies truly solve the problem of flight delays? Drewry believes that shippers, freight forwarders, and ports all need to maintain a cautious attitude.
According to a Drewry report, as the average waiting time for ships arriving at European ports has lengthened (reaching 1.9 days in October), major liner companies are finding that operational systems strictly adhering to established schedules are facing challenges.
Drewry’s Container Capacity Insight data shows that ship waiting times at several major European ports are generally longer than those at Chinese ports.
The causes of delays are complex, covering port strikes, congestion, adverse weather, infrastructure bottlenecks, as well as unforeseen events and schedule changes such as ship groundings. Some of these factors are clearly beyond the control of carriers and ports.
After five consecutive months of increase, rising from 40% to 44%, the schedule reliability on the Asia-Europe route fell back to 39% in October. According to Drewry market sources, feeder liners are currently experiencing particularly prominent delay issues at European ports.
In Drewry’s view, higher schedule reliability would undoubtedly bring significant benefits to all parties, including ports, shippers, and freight forwarders, avoiding huge losses caused by issues such as demurrage charges, inefficient terminal operations, and rising land transport costs.
However, major European ports operate at very high utilization rates with limited capacity elasticity. Congestion at a single port can easily trigger a chain reaction, causing delays to propagate to downstream ports, continuously worsening the situation and greatly reducing the scope for alternative solutions.
Drewry is discussing short-term and long-term strategies with shippers to cope with frequent delays. In Drewry’s opinion, even if the delay problem is brought under control, it will not completely disappear.
Drewry stated that it will continue to track and report on dynamics such as schedule reliability, flight cancellations, port dwell times, and port congestion, aiming to communicate trend developments to the industry and showcase the performance of various liner companies.
