What We Do...

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We offer legal and practical guidance in respect of buying, selling and owning boats. You may be a private individual, a corporate body, operating as a business or perhaps even multiple owners. If you’re involved with boats or with the yachting industry itself, we can help. Find out what makes us different and how we can be of service to you or your organisation…

Our expertise includes:

1.    The legal and financial aspects of buying & selling boats – whether you are an organisation, a syndicate, an experienced boat owner or starting from scratch YachtingLawyers can help.  Perhaps you are struggling to obtain finance to buy a boat, having problems selling your boat, or looking to see how you can get the most out of your investment, YachtingLawyers will provide you with information about deciding on what boat to buy, right through to preparing and negotiating legal contracts.

2.    Ways to protect your boat – we offer various help and guidance for protection of you and your vessel which includes; registering your boat, taking out insurance, ownership structuring advice (including UK company formations and off-shore company & trust structuring),  registering charges against a vessel,  Tax and VAT considerations. YachtingLawyers help you avoid the common pitfalls and significantly reduce the risks commonly associated with vessel ownership.

3.    Advice on operating commercially and boat business – if you are currently chartering your vessel, thinking of chartering,  or maybe looking at ways to make your investment work for you such as multiple or fractional ownership, YachtingLawyers can help. We advise on and take care of the legal and commercial arrangements involved in all aspects of operating your boat commercially, right from the start of helping you set up your business venture, through to selling it.

4.    “Legal MOT Service” – YachtingLawyers offer a review of commercial contracts to businesses operating in the yachting industry. Basically it is a good chance for businesses and their owners to review and update their current terms of business such as; letters of engagement, management agreements, charter agreements, website terms and conditions, privacy policies, shareholders agreements and licences. Make sure your terms of business and associated documents reflect the business you are operating and that they are in-line with current law such as the Companies Act 2006. This will protect your business and minimise any future exposed risk.

5.    Facilitator of business – whatever your query we aim help through our own expertise or using our trusted network of contacts we have built up over the years. If your matter invloves a collision, debt recovery, vessel arrest, salvage or construction disputes  for example, we can put you in touch with experts in these particular fields.

We do:

• Work nationally and internationally predominantly in London, the South East and South West of England and British Red Ensign off-shore jurisdictions (read our free British Red Ensign Flagging Guide)
• Work closely with longstanding contacts in the off-shore world to be able to offer our clients a whole host of offshore expertise from trusted law firms to corporate providers and trust companies
• Work remotely using today’s online and remote working technologies to correspond and communicate with our clients and each other by telephone and email, ensuring that quality advice can be given from anywhere
• Have only a small and very practical management team, and offer support for non-legal services where possible
• Regard ourselves as a facilitator  of business – if it’s not within our area of expertise you will have the benefit of being introduced  to our trusted network of contacts
• Support and work with recognised and reputable marine industry organisations
• Use only senior solicitors with at least 5 years commercial legal expertise

We don’t:

• Have expensive city offices
• Use unqualified paralegals or inexperienced solicitors to complete client work
• Employ a whole raft of practice management, marketing and administrative staff in our business
• Offer advice on areas which are not specialised in; for example, on issues such as vessel collisions, construction disputes, or arrest of vessels we outsource and bring in expertise from our trusted network of legal contacts whilst managing the relationship, so you get the best service possible.

You benefit from:

• Direct access to no-nonsense, practical advice from specialist senior solicitors
• A flexible and responsive personal working relationship
• A single point of contact
• Competitive charging as a result of our reduced overheads – you won’t be paying for fresh flowers, expensive biscuits or city centre rent
• Our lawyers visiting your business, office, marina, boat yard – when we feel face-to-face contact is key.