Work Delay? Things Should be Paid Attention to before Ramadan!

During Ramadan, working hours of Muslim-related government, Customs, ports, agencies and enterprises will be shortened, which leads to low productivity or even wok stagnation. If you have shipping arrangement during the time, you may subject to extra shipment fees.

Therefore, to avoid loss, it is suggested that you’d better follow up with shipment status in case of any emergency such as shipment delay or transshipment rejection.

Routes Adjustment

For this, shipping companies have also made adjustments on shipping routes during Ramadan.

APL’s routes adjustment on Middle-East regions

Hapag-Lloyd’s routes adjustment on Asia to Arabian Gulf

Involved Countries

There are 48 involved countries, mainly locate in western Asia and Northern Africa. 

All Arab countries, include

Non-Arab countries, include

What should you pay attention to 

during Ramadan?

❶ Have the cargo arrive at the port before Ramadan and inform consignee to pick up goods as soon as possible after cargo arrival. Generally, working period is longer than usual during Ramadan.

❷ If the cargo arrive at the port during Ramadan, you can ask the shipping company for a Free Time of 14-20 days.

❸ The best idea is that you can have the cargo arrive at the port after Ramadan but before Eid al-Fitr holidays.     

During Ramadan, working hours of the officials from related government, Customs department, ports and freight forwarding agencies will be shortened, which results delay in document examination and approval.

Meantime, traffic conjestion will occur at the destination port before Ramadan. In this case, if it is not an urgent delivery, you’d better arrange shipment after Ramadan.

Taking an example of Less Container Loading (LCL) in Middle-East ports, it usually takes approximately 30 days to finish LCL transport.

Particularly, most of customers want to have cargo arrive at the port before Ramadan and they try to book more cargo spaces, which is likely to the “space conjestion”.

Thus, it is suggested that you can choose air transportation for cargoes with high value.

Work decrement of dockmen will decline because of fasting in daytime, so it takes much longer to handle with shipment and cargo work. In such case, there will be more time for transshipment and the specific dealing time is unpredictable.