Indonesian port operator Pelindo III to switch to rupiah billing

Pelindo III’s finance director Saefudin said that to calculate its foreign harbour service fees, the company would use the day’s foreign currency exchange rate reference and BI’s exchange rate at the closing session in the previous day.The authority would also modify applications to formulate the calculation of claim bills, he said.

Saefudin explained that based on a Pelindo III board of directors’ decree and an agreement between Pelindo I, II, III and IV, the port operator would centralize the entry of its daily foreign currency exchange rate by using BI’s exchange rate as a reference.“As such, claim bills will be denominated in rupiah,” he said.All of the adjustment measures, he added, were in line with BI Regulation No.17/3/PBI/2015 and Circular No.17/11/DKSP/2015 on the mandatory use of rupiah in the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia starting from 1 July.

To prepare for the regulations, Pelindo III would implement hedging policies for financing needs in US dollars, Saefudin said. To that end, he went on, Pelindo III was preparing a hedging policy and a new standard operating procedure. It also intended, he said, to sign the International Swaps and Derivatives Association’s (ISDA) Master Agreement with the banking sector, so that Pelindo III could carry out both forward transactions in purchasing US dollars (instead of only spot transactions) and cross currency swaps from US dollars to rupiah, taking market conditions into account.

Saefudin said he was optimistic that Pelindo III’s adjustment measures would run well, at the same time promising a transition period to avoid confusion among clients.“We will introduce these policies to all Pelindo III stakeholders, especially related to our foreign services,” he said.