General
The primary goal of this service is to reduce the commercial risk of losses by providing maximum protection during the physical commercial transactions of crude oil, petroleum products and petrochemicals and to avoid costly claims where possible. This protection is required during custody transfers for a variety of reasons ranging from conflict of interest with counterparties, pilferage, human error, equipment failure, poor measurement practices etc. The presence of one of our Expeditors offers an added level of protection and an extra set of eyes and ears to mitigate such issues.
Ship to Ship Transfers
Poor decisions during STS quantification cause losses. Whether to use the average of the two vessel transfer figures, with or without VEF application, and whether either Vessel has inaccurate calibrations when tanks are slack. These issues need an experienced mind to understand the implications and to ensure that all involved parties present the correct data. This is our role under these circumstances.
Tank Cleaning
Whether changing from dirty to clean products, vegetable oils to CPP, or loading sensitive products; OBQS provides professional tank cleaning supervision to avert quality issues. We frequently attend Man Entry Inspections (MEI) prior to loading Aviation Fuels, GTL, and costly Drilling Fluids, on behalf of Oil Majors and Traders and to date have a 100% issue free record where our recommendations have been followed.
Representation
Our Personnel are familiar with the internationally accepted standards required for witnessing or conducting physical analysis of crude oil and petroleum products, and act as Client Representative’s for contractual disputes and / or claim settlement.
Loss Investigation
Losses can be defined as real and/or apparent and can vary tremendously in nature. Factors responsible for losses include but are not limited to; theft, bad terminal procedures, erroneous procedures, calculation flaws, analytical testing and reporting faults, quantities remaining on board ships, (OBQ/ROB), vapour losses, spillages, etc.
Our investigations, findings and reports have proved to be of great value to many of our Clients for mitigating or settling claims.
Investigations involve dealing with counterparties, insurance companies, and the legal profession.
Experience coupled with professionalism for bulk liquid movements (Quantity and Quality) we have been very successful mitigating losses through investigation.
Litigation & Disputes
OBQS has acted as expert witnesses for Cargo disputes on a number of occasions and interacted with Arbitration Counsel when required.
Settlement before reaching arbitration is far more cost effective and pro-active loss control can achieve this, but when all else fails, having an experienced Expeditor in your corner at court is very useful.
Blending services
OBQS have blended all manner of Products from Mogas through to Fuel Oil and Vacuum Residues. Our Management and Expeditors are very competent in ensuring that client blend operations are successful from the planning stage through to ensuring that the correct ratio has been loaded in the correct sequence. We are also regularly engaged to ensure additives are optimized when required and product certified in accordance with the required Standard.
Cargo improvement
OBQS regularly supervises the addition of Fuel Additives to crude oil, fuel oil and clean product cargoes to improve specific quality and reach specification targets. Typical additives include metal deactivators, hydrogen sulphide scavengers, cold flow improvers, octane improvers and conductivity improvers. OBQS can provide a complete tailored solution for cargo improvement from arranging additive supply, performing the additivisation, correctly gathering cargo samples before and after, and can arrange testing in a 3rd party laboratory as appropriate. To date, all our cargo improvement projects have been successful in terms of quality and economy.
