Almost 10 years ago, when I was traveling on an oil tanker, a young chief mate on board my ship. Asked me if the ship would ever be loaded in Iraq. When I asked them why they were so interested in Iraq. They innocently told me that no surveys were conducted at Iraqi ports. After loading was completed and that bills of lading were created based on figures provided by the ship.
The ship is almost 99% loaded with crude oil. And her B/L number provided by the ship will be less than 98% of the total cargo. More than 1% of this cargo will be sold to small barges organized by the facility. Off the coast of maritime nations in the Arabian Sea. The spoils are divided equally among everyone on board and on land. When I told him that something like this could not happen on my ship. He was very disappointed and left the ship after a few weeks.
Have you ever faced food problems, pay problems, seizure of a ship, engine damage. Coercion by senior officers, abandonment by shipowners, etc Well, these are the many seafarers on ships around the world. These are just some of the many problems people face. The main reason for these problems is greed, which is a global phenomenon. Corrupt captains, chief engineers, senior officers. And ship supervisors can make life miserable for the crew by acting alone or in collusion with other shore forces. If corruption is being led by coastal managers. It is time to leave the company and report such maritime frauds cases to the authorities.
What Exactly Is maritime frauds?
And how do you recognize it? maritime frauds can happen anywhere. Whether it’s a ship, a shipping company’s office, or a trading company that transports goods by sea. The list goes on. Surely, he must involve two or more parties, one or more of whom must have improperly. Or illegally obtained goods or services from another party. Such situations can occur anywhere, so seafarers. Should avoid directly or indirectly interfering with operations or forcing senior officers to engage in misconduct that could cause both financial and reputational damage. It is important to be especially careful. The International Maritime Bureau, or IMB, was established in 1981 as a specialized division of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) to detect, inform, and combat such maritime frauds.
It is a non-profit organization.
Even the IMO, in its resolution A 504(XII) (5) and (9) adopted on 20 November 1981, issued a directive to governments, organizations and stakeholders to combat maritime frauds worldwide. We encourage mutual cooperation and information exchange. We hope that all seafarers are already aware of her Malaysia-based IMB Piracy Reporting Center and that they regularly receive global piracy reports on board their ships. Some of these maritime frauds cases are visible and easily discovered, while others remain hidden for long periods due to a lack of evidence.
Types Of Maritime Frauds Here’s What You Can Easily See On Board:
- The captain and/or chief steward manipulate transactions by signing for unclaimed goods or sharing the spoils with suppliers and issuing invoices.
- A senior deck officer and/or a ship’s crew member who sells the ship’s stores and cargo.
- A senior marine engineer manipulates shortages by selling bunkers and leaving cargo (diesel) in oil tankers by supplying more fuel to ships at a lower price.
- The Senior Marine Engineer agrees to accept replacement parts for inferior machinery.
- Senior Deck Officer operates B/L No.
- Ship supervisors, alone or in conjunction with senior deck officers, inflate invoices with supplies/spares and/or repair work not performed in the repair yard.
- Cargo inspectors work in conjunction with senior deck officers and manipulate daily results to improve ratings. This is most common on bulk carriers.
- Agents, longshoremen and suppliers work with senior executives on board to manipulate invoices.
- Seafarer agents manipulate seafarers’ salaries.
- Crew agencies use fake certificates, CDCs, etc. To bring non-certified crew members on board at low wages.
- Senior officers on board manipulate figures from oil logs in order to hide defects in the ship’s machinery and pump residue overboard through portable hoses.
- A senior deck officer works with the ship’s owners and managers to operate the oil tanker’s cargo count and pump tailings (diesel) into the bunker tanks.
- The ship’s crew and/or master intentionally and illegally transport a stowaway.
- Crew and/or captain of a ship carrying contraband on board.
- Insurance maritime frauds by ship owners/managers who falsified ship records in conjunction with crew members and masters.
Included
This may include deaths on board (murders are reported as suicides). I could go on, but seafarers need to remain vigilant in their own interests. And this article, Please be alert and identify several other cases of this type of maritime frauds that are not listed and bring them to the attention of port authorities. Whistleblowers are being rewarded handsomely these days, as was the case with the third engineer who provided the U.S. The Coast Guard has substantial evidence of wrongdoing by the chief engineer that caused environmental pollution years ago. The chief engineer received a long prison sentence, but the junior engineer received $1 million and U.S.
Citizenship.
Today’s seafarers have many opportunities to gather evidence against wrongdoings committed on board. One of them is intrinsically safe explosion-proof cameras for various spy devices in hazardous environments and also indoors. From false bottoms and also defective tracking tapes provided by bunker vessels to bunker delivery notes and various stores/supplies provided to vessels, increased vigilance and awareness can prevent many maritime fraudsulent activities. Never allow older people to be intimidated or coerced over environmental issues. Any quality problems or deficiencies should be reported to the captain, and she must have at least two crew members countersign all invoices received on board.
Suspicious
Finally, report any suspicious crew member behavior to your supervisor.It is important to remember that any kind of ignorance will not help if cheating occurs on board. Because crew members were on board, the incident is presumed to have occurred with the full knowledge of the captain and/or crew unless either reported the incident long before authorities discovered it. Although the main reason for such maritime frauds is primarily greed, maritime frauds at sea is often caused by coercion on the crew by senior officers or outsiders or by coercion by the captain’s own company personnel, ship owners, agents, ports, etc. It can also occur due to administrator enforcement. And criminal organizations.
