Business Strategic Moves

We have changed our trading name from ZimCargo to TBS. ZimCargo is still our registered company name in the UK, we will use the trading name to avoid the confusion on the market as a London based Vendor is using our name.

Our contact telephone numbers and bank details remain the same. We have added new staff to our Sales Team just in case you don’t hear the familiar Agents on the phone.

Sea Freight

We landed our Christmas Container just in time for Christmas, all cleared deliveries were done in the short period despite the problems on the ground.

We have posted on the website our sailing schedule up to June 2009, collection dates will be updated for every shipment. Customers are encouraged to book their Collections well in advance so we keep the service affordable cutting costs wherever possible through consolidation.

Air Freight

We have Airfreight to Harare every week, please allow up to one week for delivery. We use mainly passenger aircrafts on Harare route so if they have a full passenger load they leave cargo.

We currently have a promotional price for Tanzania and Kenya where we are expanding our operations.

Airfreight collections are now concentrated over the weekend to try and make the Service affordable to our Customers by spreading the costs over a number of collection points. We however accommodate urgent shipments and at times make use of our network of Couriers and still charge the client the website collection price.

Maputo Service

There is no good news unfortunately, as we were expecting to find a route which will drive our freight costs down.

Maputo is about 1,500km from Harare, not so scary for those who have been in the business long enough when we used to hit the Harare-Durban motorway to pick up Japanese vehicles, the distance is almost the same. The major difference is that in Mozambique you travel through virgin land with virtually no built up areas with towns which do not exactly fit the description from a Zim perspective. The road is generally good except for a stretch of about 200km which is a mixture of tar and gravel road, beware of pot-holes, our advice is to drive during the day.

• The Mozambique Customs want all transit vehicles to pay a Bond which is equivalent to the duty applicable in that country. This bond will be refunded after the vehicles have crossed the boarder.
• The Mozambique Customs do not accept Telex, only original B/L

We gave the feed back to the Shipping Line which is also new to the Port and they assured us they will put pressure for the Port Authorities to relax their systems. We also managed to meet a Representative of the Clearing Agents Association and they are also putting pressure on the Customs department to accept their bonds to cover all goods in transit. The Zimbabwe High Commission in Maputo has also been informed of the problems and they are going to make consultation to see if they can help out. We are going to follow up all the initiatives and update you from time to time.

We are still taking bookings for the route as we still see it as a cost effective for heavy vehicles.

Grocery

We have expanded the service to ensure “thy shall never go hungry… until £=Z$” The environment on the ground is so different from 10 years back, more pressures on the Cash you send, it may be a good idea to send Food as it guarantees there is something to eat every day.

We have good news for our Bulawayo and Gweru destination Customers. We have from January 2009 started a Shuttle service to deliver Grocery every Thursday subject to the situation on the ground. We had used SWIFT service for over two years but because of the US$ inflation in Zim we found the service to be expensive to our Customers. We also want all our Customers to have the same product choice irrespective of location, now you can Enjoy All fresh products. Help Us Help you by planning your Order in advance.

We now offer wide choice products as we have now built the capacity on the ground strategically without compromising our delivery targets.