Week #09 | 28 February 2019

It is February 28th and the last day of the month. Again, one starts to wonder where the last two months went.

Today, I want to speak a bit about scams. In our online world, scams of all kinds are happening. Weekly, if not daily, we hear about identity theft, online banking fraud, phishing and whatnot. What concerns me the most are smart sales people calling unsuspecting older people, who might be from a generation when people were possibly more trustworthy. Even modern day business people may fall into the traps of these smart sales people on the phone trying to sell whatever. One scary example was uploaded to Youtube recently, concerning an American-run call centre in Manila that was running a defrauding scheme towards mainly Australian retirees. See this video for more info.

Of course. there’s no doubt that in today's world, greed and thirst for profit often get the better of us. Banks don’t help, as we all know they’ll lend you an umbrella when it’s sunny, only to ask for it back when it starts raining. Still, I cannot help but feel sorry for the victims of fraudsters, who these days come in all shapes and sizes. Just because someone wears a tie and claims to come from, say, Germany or Switzerland, that doesn’t mean that they aren’t crooked, so my advice is to watch out, no matter how well they can speak English.

After all, English is just a language (and I’d even dare ask, where would England be if their language wasn’t the world’s number one language?). So we must always pay attention carefully, no matter how nice English sounds when spoken well. Our own industry has also seen its share of scammers and fraudsters. I regularly hear that there’s been a recent barrage of emails coming out of south China that begin ‘dear friend’, or ‘hello sir, we are the best project freight forwarders in China’ and offering ridiculous rates. They then keep the bills of lading and squeeze the unsuspecting foreign forwarder to pay more before release.

In Germany recently, a freight forwarder who owed money to several unsuspecting overseas agents tried to fold up his tent to start a new company. He would start it this time in his wife's name, leaving the former company and its debts to sink with the debt. So then, we all must be aware. Of course, here at PCW, we are more than happy to spread the word about fraudsters and scammers and to do our part to ensure that our readers don’t fall into their traps like others before them.

Many fraudsters know that, up to a certain amount, people would rather forget a loss than to ask overpriced lawyers for advice. After all, one thing we can be sure of is that a lawyer won’t pick up the phone for a minute without a charging for an hour. In my view, there should be a small claims court to efficiently handle such matters for the benefit of the many. Most of us would prefer to go the legal route over the ‘Russian’ way, so to speak.

In this week’s edition of PCW, we start off in a beautiful country divided into east and west, by which I mean Malaysia. We speak to a local project freight forwarder that I have known for several years and he gives some insights into the solutions that he can offer to and from his country. We then pay a visit to Northern Ireland, a place very much in the news nowadays due to Brexit and the backstop that we hear about daily. We talk to a local and well-versed freight forwarder there. Staying on the British Isles, we talk with an NVOCC who offers services into Latin America. That is quite interesting because we don’t come across NVOCC's covering that territory very often.

We provide you with a bit of shipping and industrial news from various places and we finish off with our usual Picture and Video of the Week, which may interest you. It will certainly impress upon you the developments in shipping over the last fifty or so years. Finally, we come to a conclusion with wise words. Have a good rest of the week.

Until next time, I remain,

Seafair (UK) Limited

Interview with Mr. Sean Stokes
Managing Director

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