The ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles have announced that the implementation of the “container dwell fee” will be delayed for another week, until December 13.

                  Port of Los Angeles, USA 

The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have announced that the implementation of the “container dwell fee” applied to ocean carriers for imported containers located at the terminals will be delayed for another week, until December 13.

The decision on the “container dwell fee” was first announced on October 25, and since then, long-term cargo at the terminals of these two ports has decreased by 37%.

This is the fourth time that San Pedro Bay ports have postponed the application of this fee. The CEO of both ports of Los Angeles / Long beach in California explained that they will reevaluate the implementation of the fee after a week of additional data monitoring.

The policy was developed in collaboration with the Biden-Harris Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force, the US Department of Transportation, and various supply chain stakeholders, which aims to ease congestion in West Coast ports and increase cargo throughput at their maritime ports.

The interim policy approved by the Port Authority Commission on October 29 by both ports defines that ocean carriers may be charged per imported container as follows:

For containers scheduled to be moved by truck, shipping lines may be charged for each container staying for nine days or more, while for containers moving by rail, shipping lines may be charged if a container is stored for six days or more.

US ports plan to charge carriers under these two categories at $100 per container, increasing by $100 per container per day until the container leaves the port.

Before the pandemic-induced surge in import volumes began in mid-2020, on average inland cargo containers were in ports in under four days, and rail containers were in less than two days, according to a statement.

Port officials reminded that any fees collected from cargo will be reinvested into programs designed to improve efficiency, speed freight and deal with congestion effects.