SeaIntel unveils reliability index

    Maritime analyst SeaIntel on Monday released a new measure of liner carrier reliability.
    The SeaIntel Global Liner Schedule Reliability report will track, on a monthly basis, 1,300 vessels arriving at more than 200 ports globally, with reliability figures given on 16 global trade lanes.
    The first report, which looks at July and August arrivals, measured 13,500 arrivals over the two-month period. It found that Hamburg Süd was the most reliable carrier within the global top 20, with 85 percent of its vessels arriving on time in both months.
    Maersk Line was second, with a 77 percent on-time arrival rate in July and 74 percent in August. CSAV was third in July, at 76 percent, but was replaced by MOL in August, with the Japanese line arriving on time 70 percent in that month.
    The five least reliable top 20 carriers had global on-time performance of 40 percent to 54 percent, though some lines had lower rates in specific trade lanes.
    SeaIntel considers a vessel on-time if it arrives on the same calendar day as scheduled, or one calendar day early.
    SeaIntel Chief Executive Officer and Partner Lars Jensen told American Shipper that on-time reliability was highest in reefer trades from South America.
    “When we use these data to look specifically at South America, we find that out of the 16 main trades we cover, the two reefer-dominated trades from South America — northbound to Europe and North America — are the trades with the highest average schedule reliability,” Jensen said. “Both these trades have an average reliability of 79 percent, although individual carrier performance within these trades vary from 22 percent to 100 percent.”
    Global schedule reliability fell from 65 percent in July to 63 percent in August.
    SeaIntel’s report provides another measurement of reliability — an area of increasing scrutiny among analysts and some lines. MOL and APL release monthly on-time arrival updates — though both cover limited trade lanes, with APL focusing on head-haul transpacific arrivals.
    London-based Drewry Maritime Research has its own quarterly container shipping reliability index, based on a similar methodology’s as SeaIntel, which measures on time arrivals of around 200 vessels per week.