TSA STARTING TO WIELD ITS MIGHT

CII has invested a huge amount of time and money becoming fully TSA compliant. Most forwarders thought TSA’s muscles would not be flexed until 100% screening of freight became mandatory in about nine months time. Zachary Zemby, Jeremy Vergara, Peter Lamy and Ronen Donde have spent countless hours studying the TSA regulations and the accompanying amendments to ensure the company is totally aware of its legal obligations. At six last night I left a meeting attended by all operational staff that had been going on for nearly an hour and was nowhere near finished. This old guy is ready to concede his days of schoolbooks are well behind him and I am not proud I am the only person inside the company who had to re-sit his in-house “TSA exam” twice. You can imagine my input to the discussion was one of observation rather than one of contribution. As I listened to every point raised and discussed I realized anyone within the industry who still thinks the TSA will either go away or become some ineffective bureaucracy should get out of the industry now.

The TSA may have taken a little while to find its feet, but there is no question today they have all their ducks in a row. While I facetiously claim the greatest terrorists in America live and work in Manhattan or Washington DC, we have to take seriously the fears of future 9/11’s taking place and the form our terrorist enemies may strike us with. The man in the street would be surprised to learn 20% of a typical airline’s revenue is derived from airfreight. Because the bulk of the population thinks airfreight is all about UPS and FedEx, airfreight on passenger airlines falls off the radar screen. That being the case this could give the terrorist what he considers a great opportunity to implement an alternative attack plan. Unfortunately for him, the TSA regulations have covered every nook and cranny of the processes required to make it nigh on impossible for a forwarder who is 100% in compliance to allow a “gift” from a terrorist slip through the cracks which would result in a disaster.

Being TSA compliant is not about being near enough is good enough. It is a black and white issue. Either a forwarder treats security as the top priority, as we have set out to do, or he should get out of the business altogether. I personally believe it will not be the recession being the root cause of the demise of so many forwarders, but the TSA catching up on their illegal practices and thus forcing them out of business. At CII we have invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in screening equipment and almost as much in staff training. We believe this investment is going to pay off handsomely. We are looking forward to a strong 2010 helped greatly by the company deciding to invest in security training and equipment when most of the industry thought it was unfashionable and unnecessary to do so.

Tags: CII, FedEX, Jeremy Vergara, Peter Lamy, Ronen Donde, TSA, UPS, Zachary Zemby