In the last year or so, it has become clearly evident to us that ocean carriers are treating European and other forwarders differently than how they deal with U.S. forwarders, creating a distinctly competitive disadvantage for U.S. ocean forwarders, NVOCCs and Customs brokers. The bottom line activity is that ocean carriers are creating beneficial sell rates to “forwarders”, usually in ocean carriers’ tariffs, for use exclusively by European forwarders located in certain locations in Europe and elsewhere (not the U.S.). We are using the term “forwarders” here in the U.S. sense. But for our narrative here, the European forwarder, located in Europe and other locations[1], will dispatch cargo from Europe based on lump sum rates formulated from the sell rates offered to them by the ocean carriers, but will not hold out as NVOCCs, nor issue house bills of lading. Many of these forwarders are neither licensed nor registered with the FMC as NVOCCs. In fact, U.S. forwarders under the current definition of “forwarders” could similarly issue lump sum rates under the current FMC regulations for export transport from the U.S. Unfortunately, the ocean carriers, probably sensitive to U.S. regulatory structures do not provide U.S. forwarders similarly competitive rate structures for exports from the U.S. or for inbound traffic controlled by U.S. consignees. But also, more egregiously, if a U.S. forwarder, who also may be an NVOCC/Customs broker, controls import cargo to be shipped to the U.S. on a “collect” basis, the U.S. Ocean Transportation Intermediary (“OTI”) may have to “purchase” a favorable rate from the unlicensed, unregistered forwarder in Europe who does have the benefit of the competitive rate, even though it may not be a licensed or registered NVOCC.  The question: Is this legal? After discussing this with FMC officials, the answer is, “Probably.”…
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