Port operator International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI) has released the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) as well as the user guide for the Terminal Appointment Booking System (TABS) points payment scheme that will be strictly implemented at the Manila International Container Terminal (MICT) beginning March 16.
Under the IRR, a user can start booking once he receives the Online Release System (OLRS) for imports and submits the pre-advisory for exports. Slots for booking are classified into three demand zones: free, medium, and high. Slots in the medium and high demand zones are charged 300 points (equivalent to P300) and 1,000 points (or P1,000), respectively. The free demand zone has no charge.
Points—in which one point is equivalent to P1—can be used to pay for business transactions made via TABS. Each account is required to have sufficient points balance (6,500 points) in order to make bookings in TABS.
As an incentive, a rebate of 300 points, or worth P300, is given to a user who meets a Sunday booking on time.
An incentive will also be granted to users that book double transactions. This means that when a user books an export or empty drop-off, the associated import pick-up will be free of charge. A double transaction has two phases: manual acceptance of import and TABS booking for both import and export.
Phase 1 is when the user books an export laden or empty in TABS and then presents the import gate pass upon arrival at terminal gate. ICTSI noted that “no booking is required for the import pick-up as long as export is booked.”
Phase 2, on the other hand, is booking an export laden or empty in TABS and then checking the “double transaction” box to auto-generate a slot for an import booking. Both export and import will be booked in the same slot in TABS but only the export booking will be charged (if slot selected comes with a fee).
Slots can be changed or cancelled up to 24 hours before the appointment schedule at no charge. Although the original booking charge will not be refunded, “users avoid no-show penalties.”
ICTSI will also be implementing a terminal grace period which allows trucks to arrive one hour before their appointment slot and make use of MICT’s Pre-Gate Area (PGA).
Trucks will be allowed to arrive two hours after the appointment without penalty, thus providing a four-hour window to arrive at the terminal. But if a truck arrives more than two hours after the appointment, a late penalty fee of P1,625 will be charged.
If a truck arrives more than three hours after the appointment slot, it will be charged a no-show penalty fee of P3,251. ICTSI noted that if a truck arrival is within a no-show cut-off, it will be charged a no-show penalty and will be allowed to proceed to the PGA to wait for a new booking to be made by a customs broker.
Penalties will be implemented starting April 1.
Furthermore, trucks will now be allowed to pass through the truck routes of Metro Manila during truck ban hours as long as their shipment for pick up or drop off has a corresponding TABS booking. This exemption from the truck ban is embodied in Metropolitan Manila Development Authority Memorandum Circular No. 06-2016, which takes effect on March 16.
Under the MMDA circular, for the morning truck ban, trucks are exempted for two hours before the booked slot, and exempted for another two hours after leaving the terminal. For the afternoon truck ban, a two-and-a-half hour exemption before a booked slot is given to trucks going to the terminal and another two and a half hours after gate out.
ICTSI noted users can edit their truck plate numbers in the system any time. It added users “must ensure that plate numbers are added and updated accordingly in your bookings as this will be the reference number used by traffic enforcers to monitor and check if you have a TABS booking via the TABS SMS Tracking System.”
