Rotterdam Tank Terminal Scams
Any petroleum sales and purchase agreement that requires any upfront payment by so called buyers should be taken with caution. This includes payments like document endorsement, tank farm access fees, tank storage extension fees. Agreements with logistics companies and petroleum sellers that require any payment for Authorization to Verify (ATV) storage capacity, and/or Dip Test Authorization (DTA) including endorsements from the Port of Rotterdam Authority (by request or requirement) should be considered as wrong by definition. These are often used as methods in fake transactions or scams that may put your money at risk.
In addition there should be always copies of an official Quality and Quantity inspection company report. This should be from official inspection companies who work in the port of Rotterdam like SGS or Intertek accompanied with an injection report from the storage company.
If the above documents are not provided then the transaction may not be legal and is a red flag for a potential scam.
Companies that operate in the Port of Rotterdam are assigned a KVK number and chamber of commerce registration. If your purported logistics company does not provide information on their registration documented with these organizations when engaging in a business relationship, then your logistics company is not legally registered to conduct business in Rotterdam.
Pro-active prevention
Our key objective is pro-active prevention. That is why, as a complement to our articles, we have set up a dedicated section of our website for a blacklist: a list of websites that are implicated in storage spoofing. These websites are highly unreliable and often based on existing companies in the port area. In some cases (part of) company or brand names of legitimate entities have been falsely appropriated. It is not our intent to harm legitimate enterprises whose brand name has been adopted, but it is necessary to publish both the name and the URL of fake websites to best enable effective prevention. For instance, Petrobras BV, a legitimate company, is featured in the list below because http:// petrobrasbv .com* is not an official Petrobras website. Moreover, tank storage is not a part of Petrobras’ business and the official website is http://www.petrobras.com.br/pt/.
The sole purpose of these blacklisted websites is to facilitate attempts to defraud and swindle companies and entrepreneurs by offering non-existent products and services.
*Please note: we’ve broken up all URLs so as to avoid hyperlinking to these websites and aiding in their Google ranking. If you wish to check out one of these websites, just copy/paste the URL and remove additional spaces. Also note that the following list serves as a resource in avoiding fraudulent websites only; FERM does not actively pursue taking these websites down.
Click here for the complete list of blacklisted tank farms