The Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) will today begin full enforcement of the collection of the Practitioners’ Operating Fee (POF) after initial three weeks soft launch in Lagos ports.
It will be recalled that the Council had on the 10th February, 2020 flagged off the collection of the POF in Lagos with practical demonstration of the step by step payment procedure on the Council’s portal before newsmen, some members of the Governing Council as well as some top members of the CRFFN Management.
Speaking during the flag off ceremony at the CRFFN Headquarters in Lagos, the Registrar and Chie Executive Officer of the Council, Barr. Samuel Nwakohu observed that the Council had worked very hard to make sure that the objective was actualized adding that it was going to be a soft launch.
He said, “I am sure most of you know what a soft launch is. A soft launch simply means that it is a launch which for now is restricted to the seaports. It is a phased thing; we will get to the airports or to the other borders eventually. And the soft launch is going to take like two to three weeks which simply means that it is a period that we will use to observe the technology. We have observed it but you know there is a difference between when you are on the field and when you do it in your office. It is going to be two to three weeks, we will look at it and whatever challenges we get; we have a response team, a sixteen member response team on ground that will attend to people. Their telephone numbers, their emails are all in the portal.”
Nwakohu reiterated that for every forty foot containers cleared at the port, the freight forwarder was to pay N2, 000 while the sum of N1, 000 was to be paid for every twenty foot container.
Taking the audience through the payment process on the portal he listed the following steps to be taken by freight forwarders to ensure seamless payment; Step 1- Access the CRFFN Portal –www.crffn.ng.gov. Step 2 –Log in with your membership number and your password. Step 3 –Select “Generate POF” tab from your dashboard. Step 4 –Enter Bill of LadingNumber. Step 5 –System will validate the Bill of Lading number and display your invoice. Step 6 – Make payment via the following payment method; 6.1 – Pay at the bank (Any Commercial Bank) using the acknowledgement slip generated. 6.2 – E-Wallet. 6.3 – Card (Net Banking). Step 7 – Print your payment receipt. Step 8 – Present your payment receipt at terminal for cargo exit.
Explaining how the portal works, the Registrar stated, “What we did is for each account; we open an E-Wallet. If you have your BVN number attached to the account, automatically, the system will open a wallet for you where you can keep funds aside for the transactions you will be running. So, if you inpute this, you will see N6, 000, it will deduct N6, 000 from your wallet. Once they resolve it, it will return back your balance to your wallet within 48 hours. Even with password having been put in, it will still not process, it has to generate one time password OTTP from your bank just like when you are buying an air ticket online. So, when that is generated now, he will input it and you will be debited.”
While presenting the printed receipt at the end of the process, he said, “This is the receipt, it is this receipt that the freight forwarder will now take to the terminal operator at the end of his transactions to exit his cargo. Now, the terminal operator will have for now because we have not integrated with the terminal operators, XL Sheet with them where these details will appear. So, they will tick from that XL Sheet. That XL Sheet will be provided by us because as this is printing, it is also storing all this information. So, at the end of the day or every two hours or three hours, we will also print them out and send to the terminal operators.
However, speaking with our correspondence in a telephone chat yesterday, one of the Directors of the Council, Dr. Alban Igwe noted that the Council was now ready for the enforcement of the collection of POF after the three weeks grace period during which the freight forwarders were expected to acquaint themselves with the workings of the payment portal and regularize their membership which according to him was a prerequisite to logging into the portal for the payment of the POF.
Igwe recalled that, “we already have a letter from the Ministry of Finance saying that POF is a condition now for one to take delivery of cargo from the ports. Awareness continues, those who want to remain relevant to CRFFN will join in the awareness team until is well.”
He observed that CRFFN was now ready to for full implementation having exhausted the grace period of three weeks given to the practitioners adding that the period also provided an opportunity for the Council to perfect its system to enable a seamless operation.
Photo: CRFFN Registrar/CEO, Barr. Samuel Nwakohu.
Send your news, press releases/articles to augustinenwadinamuo@yahoo.com. Also, follow us on Twitter @ptreporters and on Facebook on facebook.com/primetimereporters or call the editor on 07030661526, 08053908817.
