San Francisco-based freight forwarding company Flexport has filed a lawsuit against Western Global Airlines (KD, Fort Myers Southwest Florida) in which it accuses the Florida-based cargo specialist of failing to provide proper transportation, The Loadstar has reported.

As part of the two companies' four-year agreement, which had been due to end in March 2021, Western Global provided freight rotations between Los Angeles International and Hong Kong International. But Flexport alleged in its filing in a New York Southern District court that the B747-400(BCF) contracted for the job “suffered from numerous mechanical and other service issues [due to] the failure by WGA to properly maintain and/or operate the aircraft”.

Flexport alleged that the B747 became “inoperative” and that repairs took more than three months. Western Global offered an MD-11(F) as temporary cover, but this was "far inferior" to the B747 for the commercial purposes required, Flexport said in the court documents.

To meet customer demands Flexport had no choice but to “accept the use of this inferior aircraft, with the express understanding that the B747-400 would soon be operational”, but the Boeing freighter was “idle for months awaiting parts to be repaired”. Meanwhile, the MD-11 also suffered mechanical failures and delays.

Under the contract terms, if reliability, defined as delays of over 90 minutes, fell below 80% during a two-month period, Flexport could cancel the agreement 60 days after sending a written notice. Western Global Airlines’ report for March said its on-time performance was 66.1%, and in April it was 80.3%. Flexport claims this means that on average it was below 80%. The airline has disputed Flexport’s claims.

Western Global Airlines has a fleet with an average age of more than 25 years, including two B747-400(BCF)s and fourteen MD-11Fs, six of which are currently under maintenance while two are stored, according to the ch-aviation fleets module. It operated B747-400(BCF) N356KD (msn 26356) for Flexport’s trans-Pacific route for the last time on July 7, according to Cargo Facts, and the following day Atlas Air (5Y, New York JFK) took over the operation, connecting Hong Kong to Chicago O'Hare as well as Los Angeles using a B747-400(F).

ch-aviation reached out to both parties for comment. Eva Rijser, Flexport's vice president for global communications, commented: "Flexport ended the agreement because of service failures - it wasn’t meeting our needs or the needs of our customers. We now work with Plus Logistics, operated by Atlas. Plus Logistics is a wholly owned subsidiary of NCA [NCA - Nippon Cargo Airlines (KZ, Tokyo Narita)], based out of Hong Kong."

She continued: "We switched on July 8, 2019 without missing a single planned flight. The charter’s schedule is as follows: on Day 1 and Day 4 we operate between HKG and LAX and on Day 6 we operate between HKG and ORD. The new airplane is a B744-F production freighter and as a result has greater payload and the ability to carry oversized cargo because of its nose door capability."

Western Global Airlines CEO James K. Neff has since commented to ch-aviation: "At all times Western Global was in full compliance with all aspects of the agreement, including our schedule reliability."

He added: "Flexport’s contract with WGA was signed during a period of severe capacity shortages, and since Flexport’s false and meritless bad faith complaint against WGA was immediately followed by its announcement of the seamless switch to Atlas, it is obvious that as market conditions dramatically changed after a year into the 3-year contract, Flexport attempted to terminate its Agreement with WGA in breach of its contractual obligations pure and simple in order to replace it with more favorable terms.

"WGA did not experience operational problems with the 747, and it was not 'sent for repairs'. The 747 was on scheduled heavy maintenance (C-Check) at a third party provider, as required by the FAA once every 24-months. This had been planned in consultation with Flexport prior to the signing of the contract, had been agreed to by Flexport, and coordinated with Flexport ahead of time.

"The MD-11 freighter was the temporary replacement to the 747, and this too was specified in the contract. Because of the different capacity and specifications of the MD-11, the rate Flexport paid for it was much lower than the 747, as specified in the contract and pursuant amendments. The 747-400 was back in operations for Flexport in May, long before their July 7 termination date."