The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Association of Bahamas Marinas (ABM) president is predicting the industry will have been “at 70 percent” of pre-COVID levels over the Memorial Day weekend as he urged government to ease vessel clearance.

Peter Maury told Tribune Business that his marina and others were trying to “work through all the issues” relating to the processing of boat permit applications and the payment of fees via Customs’ Click2Clear website, which he described as “far more complicated than necessary”.

“Right now I have a couple of boats that are having trouble with paperwork and stuff,” he revealed. “It’s a long process. My thing is that someone from the government needs to go on there and clear a yacht with a family of five to six people and a couple of crew. Eight people.”

“It’s a very involved process, the Click2Clear. I think we can simplify the whole thing to be honest. It’s inconvenient and frustrating. Like a lot of things, it’s very temperamental. It needs to be worked through and someone has to go on and use it, understand it and see what we’re going through as an industry.”

Mr Maury said incoming boats and yachts are being asked “well over 300 questions”, including the serial number of their engines and other information that has never been sought before. “It’s like opening a bank account,” he added. “You have got to have this, have got to have that, have got to go back and get this.

“It used to be boat documents, master’s documents and move on. It’s turned into a very lengthy process. We met with Customs and they said they’d promise to look at it and get back to us.” The ABM chief said that in some instances it was taking boating and yachting clients up to four hours to clear, with information also being lost when persons tried to register.

Click2Clear was heavily touted when it was introduced as an electronic solution for boating permits and fees in February 2021. “This is another great milestone achieved by the Customs Department, which has been leading the way with the modernisation of Government services. The new cruising module on the Click2Clear platform provides a seamless and cashless collection process for cruising permit fees with online applications and payments by credit card,” said Kwasi Thompson, minister of state for finance.

“This is all a part of our digital transformation agenda. It addresses a long-standing pain point for boaters who have been clamouring for a fully digital process. It also minimises the opportunity for revenue leakage.”

Mr Maury, meanwhile, said the summer season had yet to really kick-off for Bahamian marinas as they waited for the return of their “mid-level” market, such as 40-50 foot centre consoles and sports fishing vessels, following the COVID-19 pandemic.

“With the US opening up and the Mediterranean opening up, we lose those bigger boats,” he added. “What used to fill that gap is the 50-foot and 40-foot summer boats. We’re hoping to see a good return on that, but the summer season has not really kicked-off for us in the way it has in the past. Our mid-level boat business is not as strong as we’d hoped to see.

“We can’t complain. We’re busy. It’s not record setting but we’re not empty. It’s not terrible like last year but it’s not epic. I’d say we’ll probably be at 70 percent of what we used to be, the industry as a whole. I don’t think anybody’s knocked it out the ball park this weekend, but nobody is starving. 

“Stuff is happening, boats are coming and we just have to keep what we have streamlined so we make it good for everybody. That’s our hope. It is what it is.”