The Hindu Business Line : Courier biz moves at a crawl in Hyderabad after airport shift

Hyderabad, April 7 The shift of airport from Begumpet to Shamshabad has led to severe disruption of courier business in Andhra Pradesh, with time-to-delivery increasing in the range of 24-48 hours more to several destinations, including the State capital.

Though there is no final tally of the number of couriers in the State, there are at least 150 players who do sizeable business in the twin cities alone.

“Earlier, we used to send or receive the consignments at the airport in less than hour. There used to be severe competition among the airlines on how quick they could be. They used to have their own screening mechanism, allowing them to handle cargo business quite fast,” Mr Mario Jude, General Secretary of Andhra Pradesh Couriers’ Association, told Business Line.

No wonder then that Prakash Nagar, which is stone’s throw from the Begumpet airport, is dotted with courier and cargo companies, small and big.

“The Rajiv Gandhi International Airport is 35 km away. This means we are losing out at least 3 hours on sheer distance alone,” he said.

This, however, is part of the story. At the new airport, entire cargo activity is being handled by Menzies Aviation. Courier companies are alleging that there is a delay of six hours to get the in-bound or out-bound consignments cleared.

“Consignments coming in, say, from a 9 a.m. flight is coming out after the clearance at 2 p.m., throwing the whole schedule haywire. If we get the consignments for delivery, it actually is the time for pick-ups,” he said.

When contacted, a GMR spokesperson admitted that there were delays. “We are aware. We will tell them (the cargo contractors) to smoothen the process,” he said.

Mr Hemant, an executive with sales and credit card department of First Flight Couriers Ltd, said that customers did not understand the cause for delays as they did not know the processes involved.

Mr M. Venkatesh, Regional Manager of Air State Couriers, said the courier companies now had to invest more, opening offices at Shamshabad, recruiting more people and spending on transportation.

As a result, costs are bound to increase. “We are asked to pay for screening (Rs 2 a kg) and terminal charges (Rs 1.20 a kg for in-bound and 75 paise for out-bound). If you add transportation and manpower charges, the cost has gone up by Rs 4 for a kg,” he said.

The delays are more pronounced with regard to destinations in hundreds of towns across the State as they get and forward consignments through Hyderabad.

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