From 1st March 2019, all air cargo departing from Australia will be subject to 100%-piece level screening prior to departure.
Details to hand so far are as follows:
- Screening will involve cargo x-ray, manual check / piece count or both if required.
- Screening locations
- Airline cargo terminals that currently load and unload aircrafts. There are 3 main terminals in most capital cities and these terminals are already experienced with screening procedures as the USA has bee subject to these regulations for 18 months. We await to see what new processes are adopted at these terminals to cope with the 10X factor increase in screening.
- Cargo depots equipped for screening
- There are only a handful of approved RACA third party locations in each state
- There will be more coming online in the coming months, but the approval process and the initial investment for X-Ray machines is high.
- There are costs associated with this additional level of security screening, and we anticipate these to be available in the next few days – 1 week. FYI: Most terminals have not finalised their pricing yet and neither have the Third-Party Operators.
- There will be a noticeable impact on cargo cut off times and delays in screening are anticipated within the initial implementation period after 1 March 2019.
We estimated screening times to be approx. 24 hours after lodgement in the first month, but this will dramatically improve as the process is streamlined around the country.
There will be more information and confirmations to follow.
Additional information can be found at https://homeaffairs.gov.au
If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.