Stat. declaration of recreational sea time for MNZ

[Bimini Babe 0]

Hi folks, has anyone here been through the rigmarole of declaring recreational sea time to Maritime NZ for the purposes of qualifying as a skipper? I've been staring at their website for hours (or is it weeks??!) and I can't seem to figure it out. It seems about as complicated and costly to qualify as an LLO as is was to get residency in NZ!!!

 

Sounds like recreational time is equivalent to a quarter of commercial, so if I need 6 months commercial I therefore need 2 years rec. Or, as it says on the website, I need 3,000 hours (how that equates to 2 years I also have no idea...) But is that genuine "at sea" time? I know most of the commercial guys count time tied to a dock as qualifying sea time. Hell, some of them never even leave the dock! So can I do the same as I've been living aboard, or can I only count days 'at sea'?

 

I also saw somewhere that only time on motor vessels can be counted. Now I've never been on a yacht that didn't have a motor... But does that count? Or is all my sailing time effectively worthless?

 

Anyone know how closely they look at the statutory declarations? I.e. can I safely 'guesstimate' how much time I've spent aboard each vessel, as there is no way in hell I'm going to remember every single day I've ever set foot on a boat in the last 10 years! Or if my hours are all nice round numbers are they liable to start digging deeper and ask me to provide logbooks and such?

 

Would really appreciate some advice from anyone who's been through it all before... Cheers in advance.

[Howdie2 8]

Ive been through this process a few years ago my pleasure time didnt really count for much i still needed time on commerical vessels i ended up having to do my ILO then a year or so later did my ILM they a pretty fussy with their declarations.

Cheers

Howdie

[Island Time 1,235]

Sept this year the current regs all change. Easier after that....

I'd like to do my

[Bimini Babe 0]

Hmm, not good.

 

I've been reading about the new qualifications framework - sounds like they are trying to fix a lot of the issues I've been whinging about, which is encouraging! No real indication on the MNZ website about when it will come into play though... Just a vague reference to 'throughout 2013', which will invariably mean 2015, if not beyond.

 

In the meantime, I've been offered work on a charter fishing boat, just need to get the ticket - quick! And apparently having skippered a yacht for the last 4 years, including across oceans, is inferior experience to that of the tea-wallah on the Auckland ferry. Go figure.

[Guest]

You'll find a lot will depend on who you are talking to and what time of the day it is, or at least that's what we commonly find.

 

I had 25% of my offshore only recreational time counted, at 8hrs per day, but that was a whiles back pre-MNZ.

 

MNZ are going thru a something but no one seems quite sure what, why and how it will pan out. Hopefully they will come out the other side having dragged themselves into at least the 20th Century. {No that isn't a typo}

[grant 40]

twas a few moons ago I did all this. The stat dec is basically for unverified seatime, if the boat you were on had a skipper to sign off time that is all good. otherwise write it all down, find a person who can witness stat dec's, read it out and away you go.

 

make sure you have plenty of time in there, over is better than close.

 

Especially for your ocean stuff use days, when you arrived on board till when you left, you are looking for minimum of 375 days.

 

Realistically where you can't prove every single day, equally it can't be proven you didn't do it. I would suggest provide as much detail as you can.

 

Looking at the website it seems you can do it all on recreational time, which is a change, there used to be a requirement for some commercial time. I would double check that before you submit your sea time as you pay each time you send it in.

 

The latest i have heard on the new qualifications are 1 Jan 2014, not sure if that is set in stone either....

 

good luck

[Guest]

I once had the displeasure of signing off some seatime for an academic git who used time in his rowing 8 at highschool to qualify to his LLO. Unfortunately I had to allow him the couple of weeks he had spent with me but there is something seriously wrong when rowing time counts as seatime.

[rigger 47]

Be honest with your declaration.

If you can get enough time together to do the ILM do it.

You may still need commercial time, 60 days on a power driven vessel less than 20m.

 

Beore putting in an application:

Make a list up of you current seatime.

Decide which CoC you want to get.

Phone MNZ 0508 225522 and speak to someone - not sure who the best person to speak to now is as most have changed / retired since I did the old CLM. Get their advice and use it in a cover letter when sending in your application.

 

Worked for me when I did the MEC5 a few years ago.

[Fogg 427]

A few years ago when I was 'working' as volunteer coastguard crew in NZ we used to get our lig books signed off by rhe skipper at the end if each outing and it used to count towards commercial time. So that would be a relatively cheap and easy way to accumulate extra hours if its still true.

[PaulR 3]

I once had the displeasure of signing off some seatime for an academic git who used time in his rowing 8 at highschool to qualify to his LLO. Unfortunately I had to allow him the couple of weeks he had spent with me but there is something seriously wrong when rowing time counts as seatime.

 

 

I've heard rumours / comments that serving behind the bar onboard (taken on as deck crew) also qualified as sea time.

[rigger 47]

I once had the displeasure of signing off some seatime for an academic git who used time in his rowing 8 at highschool to qualify to his LLO. Unfortunately I had to allow him the couple of weeks he had spent with me but there is something seriously wrong when rowing time counts as seatime.

 

 

I've heard rumours / comments that serving behind the bar onboard (taken on as deck crew) also qualified as sea time.

 

Only a portion can count these days.

People have been caught trying to pass off cafe / bar staff time as full seatime.

[Bimini Babe 0]

Thanks for the replies all. Sounds like there's no easy way around it...

 

ILM? Not likely. I think the requirement for ILM is 18 months, rather than 6 months for LLO.

 

I'll be doing the required 30 days on my nominated vessel to get the LLO, but that's the only commercial time I'll be able to count. So I still need another 5 months, or 4x that in recreational time. Still not entirely sure what counts and what doesn't in that respect... E.g., I sailed to Tonga and spent 5 months there before sailing back, was rarely off the boat and was pretty much constantly sailing between islands/island groups, but can I only count passage time, i.e. 25 days total to Tonga and back? Or can I count from the time I left the dock in Opua to the time I returned, i.e. 135 days total? If I was on a commercial vessel it would most definitely be the latter, but it sounds like for recreational that's not the case? Very frustrating...

[grant 40]

I haven't seen anything that sees only passage time counts, it recreational boating time, which from what you said is 135 days. Dont try and make it harder for yourself than it is already! Be honest about your time but dont go throughing away good seatime, jsut becaue you are not sure. Look at Rigger's post, its good advice

[Pumbaa 9]

Hi, I've been through this several times in one way or another so i'll try to give some indication of what they want, I was a yacht skipper doing the Europe Caribbean thing in my 20's I had a RYA yacht master offshore ticket which was all the insurance companies wanted then. I moved to Australia with my wife (Australian) walked into the dept transport and ran into the bureaucracy. 10 years of commercially operating boats plus unknown years of recreational sailing. I also had a AYF offshore instructor ticket and I got it all signed off for 3 years of sea time and got my Master class 5 (restricted to sail). You can't take it too seriously, these are bureaucrats you're dealing with mostly. You can't take time tied to the dock but any day over 8hrs on the water counts. I had to employ a skipper in Aus whilst waiting for my license who got her ticket waiting tables on a harbour cruise. Don't worry about it accept it. Fill out your log book, ask some people to sign off your time spent on their boats. I sent requests all over the world to skippers or companies I had worked for. Their letter plus a stat dec from me verifying it's authenticity was accepted. I think you can go back 10 years. Time at anchor was marginally ok if it was surrounded by activity, ie you could sign off 2 solid weeks that included 3 full days at anchor in different locations, but they don't want to see 2 weeks only at anchor. Unless it was with posted anchor watch s and conducting dredging or something. For example a coastal classic could amount to nearly a week because of farting around in Auckland for 2 days getting the boat ready, moving it here and there, then the race 2 more days farting around in the BoI's then the return. At the end of the day, if you can show a genuine representation of the time that's all they are interested in, it's ticking a box that needs to be filled. You then have to pass all their courses any way.