CargoForwarder Global’s ‘Spotlight On…’ series highlights the manifold functions involved in ensuring smooth, efficient, and safe logistics services within air cargo. Customs plays a crucial role in facilitating and regulating air cargo transport by ensuring compliance with international trade laws and security standards. Efficient customs processes can help streamline the movement of goods, reduce delays, and minimize costs, enhancing the global supply chain’s reliability. This week, Lukas Schroeder (LS), Head of Customs Clearance, G. Englmayer, Zoll & Consulting GmbH, tells us more about his role, and shares his experience and advice for those wanting to forge a career in customs.
CFG: What is your current function and company? And what are your responsibilities?
LS: I’m working as Head of Customs Clearance for G. Englmayer, Zoll & Consulting GmbH. With my team of about 30 customs agents, we ensure a smooth customs process for importing and exporting companies in Austria.
CFG: What does a normal day look like for you?
LS: There is not really a typical day, but the main parts of my work are to support my team when they have special cases and improving the process of customs clearance with colleagues from other departments, software engineers, our customers and also the customs authorities.
CFG: How long have you been in the air cargo industry, and what brought you to it?
LS: I did an apprenticeship as a forwarding agent more than 10 years ago. As customs was already an important topic for my company back then, I had the chance to take my first steps and to dive deeper and deeper within the years that followed.
CFG: What do you enjoy most about your job?
LS: We get in touch with many different companies from different branches and countries and we get close insights into their newest innovations. For me, this a really interesting part of my job.
CFG: What do you see as the greatest challenges in our industry?
LS: We and also our customers will have to face many new regulations like the deforestation regulation, supply chain due diligence act, revised UCC, and so on, in the next years. Although there are good intentions behind these rules, I can often hardly imagine how especially smaller or medium-sized companies should handle all of them, and how much time will be left for the activities they earn money with.
CFG: What advice would you give to people looking to join the air cargo industry? Any particular training they should aim for?
LS: From my point of view, I could just give them advice on how to get into customs. For me, the most important thing is good general knowledge as you have to deal with many different branches and goods. Furthermore, a good understanding of processes and data management will help you to get ahead. There is no school or something like that for customs agents in Austria and many other EU countries, so most of it is learning by doing. This is the reason we founded the ‘Zollakademie [Customs Academy] Austria’ and ‘Zollakademie Germany’, where we offer training courses on topics related to customs.
CFG: If the air cargo industry were a film/book, what would its title be?
LS: Wings of Commerce: Through Borders and Bureaucracy.
Thank you, Lukas, for your views.
If you would like to share your personal air cargo story with our CargoForwarder Global readers, feel free to send your answers to the above questions to cargoforwarderglobal@kopfpilot.at We look forward to shining a spotlight on your job area, views, and experiences.
