Multi-Site Transitional Facility Makes Importing Easier

Multi-Site Transitional Facility Makes Importing Easier

On 1 July 2015, MPI introduced a new Application fee and increased the Annual Facility Fee in order to recover costs associated with transitional facilities.

To alleviate these costs, Independent Verification Services (IVS) has worked collaboratively with MPI to give importers a choice. IVS's new Multi-Site Transitional Facility (MTF) means importers can now have their imported low risk containers unpacked onsite without the cost of operating a Transitional Facility. This new service greatly reduces the financial strain, paperwork and stress associated with importing goods.

The MTF service provides an alternative to the requirement of maintaining a permanent Transitional Facility on site. IVS managing director Peter Webb says the IVS’s Multi-Site service is essentially “a facility that comes to your door with training staff and biosecurity equipment".

“You will no longer have the cost of MPI training, registration fees, MPI audits, operating procedures, disposal of biosecurity waste or MPI reporting”, he says. This makes the whole exercise of importing goods simple, saving importers time and money. All the importer needs is a suitable hard surface area and IVS will do the rest.

Auckland-based freight forwarders GCS Logistics is a prime example of how effective the service can be in taking care of small to medium sized businesses’ biosecurity requirements. “We have been utilising the IVS Multi-Site Transitional Facility since October 2014, across a wide variety of our clients, and have found the service to be fantastic,” says Kirsten Richardson of GCS. “They are highly responsive, really personable and they take away the hassle of the clearance, paperwork and any unique decontamination requirements of the containers.” Indeed, so much so, that this year, Richardson is not going to bother to renew her own MPI accreditation, believing that by utilising the IVS service, she is freeing up time and dollars to spend on areas that are more in need of her expertise and resources.

Such sentiments are echoed by Christchurch-based importer Sean Khalesi of Kalessie Bathroomware who says, “as the business sector starts to feel the squeeze, the economic and time-saving benefits our business gets from IVS are becoming really essential.” This is a story mirrored nationwide, as IVS see importers of low-risk containers signing up daily to this new service.

IVS Limited strives to be transparent by highlighting service costs and benefits for business owners and management teams, in order to gauge the suitability for their organisations. For this reason, IVS Limited lists a full breakdown of their own prices, as well as price comparison between their offering and the costs of running your own Transitional Facility on their website. This can be found at http://bit.ly/1La0WZE

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