Panama Canal rolls out new booking system for large vessels

The changes as part of the Transit Booking System were announced through an Advisory to Shipping.

Currently, the slot offering in the Transit Booking System is done daily ahead period before the required transit date.

Through this method, several transit booking slot packages corresponding to January of the following year will be offered to different market segments; as a result a single client will be able to obtain multiple bookings in one transaction.

Each package will include a specific number of slots with weekly or monthly frequency per year, for both northbound and southbound transits.

The packages, and their characteristics, will be announced through the Booking Slot Projected Availability published on the website pancanal.com and will be awarded to the highest bidder through an auction.

The auction amount of the sealed bid will refer to the maximum amount the customer is willing to pay for each slot included in the package with a starting base of $200,000.

These are divided into:

Period 1 (for bookings 90 days before transit)

Period 1A (for bookings from 30 to 15 days)

Period 2 (for bookings between 14 and 8 days)

Period 3 (for bookings from 7 to 2 days).

The LoTSA method is added to these with availability within the various slot packages.

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The auctions will be held starting 2 September 2024, in advance of booking dates beginning 5 January 2025, through 3 January 2026.

This new booking system will ease long-term reservations and are responding to the changing needs of the maritime industry, said the Panama Canal Authority in a statement.

The Panama Canal Authority (ACP) deputy administrator Ilya Marotta recently told Reuters that Canal operations were practically back to normal with 34 transits that will increase to 35 on August 5 and by September the ACP will be able to increase transits to 36 a day.