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Supply Chain by the Numbers
   
 

- Sept. 17, 2020 -

   
  Supply Chain by the Numbers for Sept. 17, 2020
   
 

FedEx Feeling Pricing Power; Factory Workers Leaving Job to Tend to Kids; US Manufacturing Rally Stalling; Huge Numbers of Ocean Freight Carriers Stuck at Sea

   
 
 
 
 

4.9%

That's how much rates for FedEx Express shipping will increase on average for its US domestic, export, and import services. Rates for FedEx Ground and FedEx Home Delivery services will also increase by an average of 4.9%. FedEx SmartPost service will also rise, but the company did not provide details. The company also said that its list of delivery area surcharge US zip codes for FedEx Express, FedEx Ground, and FedEx SmartPost are also set to change, beginning on January 4, 2021 – undoubtedly not in favor of shipprs. Feeling pricing power with soaring ecommerce demand, FedEx said that, effective January 21, it will also begin charging a 6% late fee to FedEx Express and Ground customers that do not pay invoices within their stated payment terms. Not content with stopping there, FedEx says that starting on January 18, 2021, a variety of new or increased surcharges will be levied, include a “High Cost Service Area Surcharge” that applies to certain shipments (not clarified). Also new will be a "Additional Handling Surcharge" levied for FedEx Express and FedEx Ground packages, with a surcharge applying to any package that measures greater than 48 inches along its longest side and measures greater than 30 inches along its second-longest side and has an actual weight greater than 50 pounds.

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25%

That rather amazingly is the estimated number of crew on ocean freight ships that are stuck on-board and can't get off, due to ports unwilling to let the ships dock and/or let workers debark. That according to Fidelity International, a huge asset manager that owns ships. Even more crazy, Fidelity estimates there are an almost equal number of ship workers who can't get on ships for similar reasons and in many cases have not worked for months, in the complex world of staffing ships worldwide. The crew stuck on ships are in many cases facing exhaustion, as the work never ends and they can't escape the ship, though some crew are simply refusing to work in an effort to be forced off the ship, the UK's Financial Times reports. " Seafarers and their unions are deeply concerned about the risk to life, property and the environment as the chances of a major catastrophe or catastrophes rises daily. Governments must act before we see more people die, or worse — a major maritime disaster," Stephen Cotton, general secretary of the International Transport Workers' Federation, told the Financial Times. Fidelity estimates that of the 1.2 million crew on merchant ships, roughly half come from China, Russia and India.

 


 
 
 
 

97.9

That was the level of the monthly index of manufacturing output for August, according to the latest report from the US Federal Reserve Bank released this week. That is basically flat with the index level of 97.0 in July, meaning manufacturing recovery from the hit caused by the pandemic may have stalled. At 97.9, that means August manufacturing volumes were 2.1% below the average month in the baseline year of 2012 (index = 100) - some 8 years later. The index is up from the recent pandemic bottom of 83.6 seen in April, but is still well below levels before the US outbreak in March, with the index at about 105 in February. The April output was also 6.9% below the same month in 2019. However, August factory capacity utilization rose a bit to 70.2% from 69.5% in July, but still well below the average of 78.2 from 1972 to 2019.

 
 
 
 

300,000

  

That rather amazingly is the estimated number of crew on ocean freight ships that are stuck on-board and can't get off, due to ports unwilling to let the ships dock and/or let workers debark. That according to Fidelity International, a huge asset manager that owns ships. Even more crazy, Fidelity estimates there are an almost equal number of ship workers who can't get on ships for similar reasons and in many cases have not worked for months, in the complex world of staffing ships worldwide. The crew stuck on ships are in many cases facing exhaustion, as the work never ends and they can't escape the ship, though some crew are simply refusing to work in an effort to be forced off the ship, the UK's Financial Times reports. "Seafarers and their unions are deeply concerned about the risk to life, property and the environment as the chances of a major catastrophe or catastrophes rises daily. Governments must act before we see more people die, or worse - a major maritime disaster," Stephen Cotton, general secretary of the International Transport Workers' Federation, told the Financial Times. Fidelity estimates that of the 1.2 million crew on merchant ships, roughly half come from China, Russia and India.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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