Insurer Ask Me For A Captain

[TacomaSailor]

A couple of my friends that live in the same marina as us are full time captains. They do a lot of training and post-purchase hands on supervision as the OP says is required by their insurance company.

My captain friends are usually paid by the broker who made the sale of the boat. That arrangement is fairly typical here with new or newish boats in the 30' or larger size.

Their typical training price, if paid by the owner / new boat owner is $200 for a 4-hour session.

[W3GAC]

Seeing this requirement more and more from insurers. I think it's a great practice with surprising little red tape/ bureaucratic paper work. I have helped a few first time titled boaters (power & sail) with this. I'm retired w/ 100T and I'm ok with them just buying/ bringing picnic lunch or dinner on days we go out together. The meals work out for them because we still talk about docking, navigation, VHF, knots, safety, rules or the road, wx, and maintenance and often wife is involved and I try to work in importance of spouse knowing basics as well... just in case. Once they are getting pretty good I let them plan their 'final exam' one or two day local cruise to new territory/ marinas if their schedule/ boat permits which gets the skipper to the required 25 hours pretty fast and a taste and earned confidence for really using their new boat to its potential. I get good logged captain time, and along with my regular retirement captain's job, it keeps me up to date on any regulation changes (and there always are), multi-boat experience, and I have another good friend on the water. I would think you might be able to find similar situation captains in your area. Check with local yacht clubs, check w/ local yards, cruising groups, as well as Captain schools in your area.


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[FamilyVan]

I'd be curious to hear what people charge for this service.

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[cortezsailor]

I'd get a second quote, never heard of that before



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[SailAllDay]

Same happened to me. I learned that had I told them that I had experience sailing the same sized boat before they wouldn't ask for that. However my broker had a great recommendation for a captain who went out with me for a couple of hours. He charged $125 for commute plus the time on my boat with me. It was useful he gave me some good pointers.

One thing is since we only went out in the bay the insurance limited me to the bay. I'm fine with this since I don't plan on going off shore yet anyway. They said i can either get the captain to go out with me off shore for 6-8 hours or wait 1 year and then I'll be able to set limits where ever I want.


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[svfraidknot]

before i bought my boat i paid another cruiser to spend the day with me on the cat .. i learned a lot and bought the boat with his recommendations ,, selling her now 42 solaris with same idea i hope to just pay a third parties opinion ,, cant afford a real survey ..

[MarkSF]

Originally Posted by SailAllDay

Same happened to me. I learned that had I told them that I had experience sailing the same sized boat before they wouldn't ask for that. However my broker had a great recommendation for a captain who went out with me for a couple of hours. He charged $125 for commute plus the time on my boat with me. It was useful he gave me some good pointers.

One thing is since we only went out in the bay the insurance limited me to the bay. I'm fine with this since I don't plan on going off shore yet anyway. They said i can either get the captain to go out with me off shore for 6-8 hours or wait 1 year and then I'll be able to set limits where ever I want.


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My insurance policy also limits me to the bay, but if you read it carefully that includes up to 25 miles outside the GG bridge.