SURABAYA (ISL News) - Five years after the Pelindo merger, standardization of container terminal services is considered to be showing positive progress. However, the standardization of systems and business processes has not yet fully achieved uniform service quality across all Pelindo terminals.
Raja Oloan Saut Gurning, a supply chain observer from the Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology (ITS), said the Pelindo merger has driven the standardization of terminal management, leading to a more centralized approach. This is evident in the alignment of business processes, the use of the Terminal Operating System (TOS), and terminal performance indicators.
"The standardization of Indonesian container services has been on the right track over the past five years. Business process architecture, operating systems (TOS), and performance indicators have been centrally standardized," Saut said.
According to him, this step is an important part of improving terminal management following the Pelindo integration. However, the next challenge is ensuring this standardization results in consistent service quality in the field.
"However, actual service consistency between terminals has not yet been fully achieved. What's currently happening is segmented consistency, consistent within each tier, but not yet homogeneous nationally," he said.
These conditions need to be considered in light of the characteristics of each terminal managed by Pelindo. Not all terminals have the same geographic conditions, equipment, vessel characteristics, and hinterland support.
"Terminals in tidal river areas like the Musi, Barito, or Kapuas have tidal windows that limit the consistency of ship arrivals and departures. This is different from deepwater ports," he explained.
According to Saut, these geographic conditions mean that terminal performance cannot be compared solely based on a single productivity indicator. Another factor is the disparity in superstructure specifications. He noted that standardizing the Terminal Operational Standard (TOS) does not automatically equalize terminal productivity if the loading and unloading equipment used is different.
“The same TOS if run at a terminal with a high-speed STS will produce different outputs than a terminal that relies solely on older HMCs or ship cranes,” he said.
Therefore, Saut believes Pelindo needs to ensure that standardization is accompanied by improvements in equipment availability and reliability. "The level of equipment readiness, or equipment availability, and mean time between failures at terminals outside Java are still uneven," he said.
(ISL News Editorial Team/Corcom Pelindo TPK).
