After months of frustrating delays at DP World's Port Botany terminal in Sydney, carriers have begun imposing congestion surcharges.

CMA CGM and ANL were first cabs off the rank late last week, announcing that import and export containers carried on the weekly New NEMO service between Australia and Europe would each be levied an additional USD82/TEU from mid-January.

'Please be advised that due to the ongoing congestion at DP World Port Botany and the subsequent negative impact on schedule integrity, we have no choice but to implement an Emergency Port Congestion Surcharge (PCS) in the port of Sydney,' the lines said.

They were joined on Monday by Maersk Line, which announced it will implement a congestion surcharge in Sydney for shipments to and from the Americas on the Oceania, PSW and PNW services from January 17.

'The implementation of the surcharge is in response to rising costs caused by ongoing congestion at DP World Port Botany,' Maersk said, advising that for cargo Sydney to/from North America, South America, Central America and Caribbean the levy will be USD100/TEU and USD200/FEU, while to/from Cuba it will be EUR75/TEU and EUR150/FEU.

Another CMA CGM service, the Australia-ECNA-Europe operation run with Marfret and ANL, is to divert ships from DP World Port Botany to nearby Port Kembla - predominantly a bulk/breakbulk port - on a trial basis, beginning this week with CMA CGM Utrillo.

The Port Botany terminal has been plagued with problems all year, variously attributed to labour shortages, the introduction of new ship-to-shore gantries and the faulty implementation of a new terminal operating system.

A line executive told CI eXpress that the situation had scarcely improved since then and remained 'absolutely diabolical'. DP World is making no public comment.