The Philippine Bureau of Customs (BOC) has stopped manual processing of Maersk Line and MCC shipments after confirming that cargo manifests, which previously could not be sent due to a recent cyber attack that affected the Danish shipping giant’s operations, can be accessed again.
“All Maersk Lines and MCC’s manifest affected by their IT System Outage on 29 June 2017 are now being submitted,” BOC officer-in-charge and deputy commissioner Gerardo Gambala said in a memorandum dated July 7.
As a result, Gambala said the manual processing of cargoes for loading onto the vessels of the sister shipping lines has been stopped.
Leo Morada, chief executive officer of BOC-accredited value-added service provider Cargo Data Exchange Center, confirmed to PortCalls that “gradually [an] increasing number of manifests are now being submitted.”
BOC district collectors previously allowed the manual processing of Maersk and MCC Transport shipments following the ransomware attack on Maersk’s systems that rendered inaccessible some shipping documents.
In a July 5 memorandum, Gambala provided guidelines for manual processing of consumption entries and transit cargoes without manifest that are for loading onto Maersk Line vessels.
In an update July 7, Maersk said while its “road to recovery is not linear,” there is progress in some of the elements that are important to its clients.
Maersk said its system’s Track and Trace feature has been restored, and updates including on loadings and discharges up to July 2 are now available on My.MaerskLine.com.
“We continue to work on this, as well as update recent schedule changes. We hope you will find this level of transparency a positive step forward for your business,” the carrier said.
Additionally, the functionality of making booking amendments on My.MaerskLine.com is back. This follows previously announced restored capabilities like book new shipments, request delivery order, print bills of lading, and access MyFinance (for invoices before June 27).
For import customers, Maersk has started sending out arrival notifications.
“We are working through the backlog, and have so far been able to send 70 percent of Arrival Notifications. We keep working day and night at this,” Maersk said.
The carrier’s customer service main lines are also finally enabled, while main lines of local offices will be back online soon. – Roumina Pablo
