- 01 October 2018
NZ Domestic Transport Earthquake Surcharge | 01 October 2018
Following the Kaikoura earthquake, KiwiRail took the opportunity to re-engineer its services, strategic direction and pricing. With significant disruption to traditional freight movement, KiwiRail increased their inter-island rates and we accordingly applied a ‘temporary’ surcharge to customers, to recover this cost while the coastal road and rail route were re-established.
In the time since the re-opening of SH1 and the Main North Line, we have held exhaustive negotiations with KiwiRail, the outcome being that costs for inter-island movements will remain at their current levels with reduced capacity. Pricing has also increased for other modes of transport, as the competitive pressure of historically low rail cost has been removed.
As a result of these market changes, from 1 October 2018 our existing disruption surcharge of 14.2% will be removed, to be replaced as follows:
- All South Island intra-island movements in and out of the Marlborough region will have the surcharge removed altogether (13.7%). Due to limited rail services, this region is traditionally dominated by road linehaul requiring unimpeded access to SH1. We expect SH1 to be fully operational heading into Spring months.
- All inter-island rates will increase by 9.8% (after the removal of the existing 14.2% surcharge)
For further information on these changes please contact your local sales representative.