In these blogs, we often discuss how to get your vessel documentation done. If you’ve been reading for any length of time, or even if you just look at the titles, you’ll see all kinds of blogs discussing how to get your initial documentation, how to change your address, change the name or hailing port, that kind of thing. Sometimes, however, you may want to delete your documentation. In this blog, we’ll discuss US Coast Guard documentation deletion and why you may want to do that. We’ll also touch on why you should turn to the Maritime Documentation Center for help with that.
Deletion from the US Coast Guard Documentation
At first, you might say “why would you want to get your documentation deleted?” After all, people go to great lengths to get vessel documentation. The truth is that there are many reasons that you may want to get your vessel deleted from the registry. For example, perhaps you bought the boat used. Maybe the original owner documented the vessel with the USCG but let the vessel get repossessed, and then you purchased it from someone else, further down the line. These kinds of potentially confusing situations are ones where you would want to delete the vessel from documentation.
Who Can Delete
Only a few people have the right to deletion a vessel’s documentation. For the record, the only people who are authorized to delete a vessel from documentation are the vessel owner or an authorized agent on behalf of the vessel owner. That’s it. You can’t delete someone else’s vessel, thankfully. To be clear, there are certain qualifications the authorized agent of the vessel owner must have to be recognized as able to delete on their behalf. As with all questions regarding vessel documentation, should you have concerns, don’t hesitate to reach out to us for further information.
Ins and Outs of Deletion
Certain information has to be given in writing so that you can delete a vessel’s documentation. You have to give the reason that you want the documentation deleted, for starters. It’s also necessary to give the vessel’s official number as well. It would be beneficial to have the original Certificate of Documentation as well, since you have to return it. That’s not all, however. You also have to provide evidence that there was a sale or transfer of the vessel. Remember, documentation for the Coast Guard is very particular about the citizenship status of those who buy the vessels. You have to give a statement which states the nationality of the owner as well as the country in which the vessel will be flagged. That’s important if the vessel is sold to non-US citizens or flagged in a foreign country.
One Place to Go
After reading the above paragraph, you may think to yourself: “that sure sounds like a lot of information.” It definitely is. Thankfully, we’ve made the process easier for you. Instead of having to fill that all out for yourself, you can just go to our website and do it. There, you’ll find several areas where you can type that all in. Of course, you don’t have to worry about writing it out by hand. You can just type in the necessary information into the right areas. We even put a detailed explanation of the needed information at the top of the page, so that there’s no confusion.
We also put in lots of space for you to type out the entire reason that you’re deleting your vessel documentation. If you ever tried filling out one of these forms by hand, then you know how annoying it can be to fill out these large chunks of information. This is particularly galling when it comes to something like the “reason for deletion,” which tends to be a long, complicated story with multiple sections. Instead of filling out an entire essay by hand, like you were back in school or something, we’ve made it so that you can type in the whole thing in just a matter of minutes.
Of course, for many, once they’ve deleted their vessel documentation, it becomes time to go on a new journey. Often, (as is the case in the example given above) someone who has deleted vessel documentation from a boat they bought then goes to get their own documentation for the vessel. Should you choose to do this, you won’t have to go far. Right above “Deletion” on our home page is a place for documentation, or you can just go to the center of our home page. There, you can use all of our resources to get your new vessel documentation. Should you have any questions about whether deletion (or any kind of vessel documentation) is right for you, give us a call at (800) 535-8570 or head to our site.