THE Port of Tanjung Pelepas has denied reports that Japanese line MOL is dropping its one call at the Malaysian port due to poor quality service.

PTP described statements made by Oshima Suzuki, MOL’s general manager, liner planning department, as inaccurate.

“After Maersk moved most of its services from Singapore to PTP I think it got too big too fast. I’m afraid they are not capable and experienced enough to handle such big volumes,” CI-Online quoted the MOL official as saying.

“PTP has enjoyed an excellent working relationship with MOL. The ‘pull-out’ was not due to lack of capacity or operational inexperience.” PTP said.

The port stressed that the terminal jointly run by PTP and Maersk Sealand had high operating standards and satisfactory equipment ratios.

It is understood that MOL has missed calls at the port in recent weeks but that the regular call has not yet been officially cancelled.

MOL was Pelepas’ first regular mainline customer putting in a regular call on its Hong Kong/Straits/Japan service in April last year. Within a few months of the call being put into PTP there was market talk that MOL was unhappy with the level of volumes it was receiving at the Malaysian Port.

“MOL, which were targeting exports to Japan, probably views that the Singapore market would be easier to tap into,” PTP said.

The only other major line to call at PTP is APL.