10 Dec 2020

Three regular port visits results in over 6 hours of administration, 2,000+ fields to be completed divided into 13 documents and 23 tabs.

When asking a captain about one of his biggest frustration on board? Usually, they will mention the port call administration.

diize offers solution to simplify port call administration

diize will illustrate the administrative burden that captains struggle with during every port call

In this post, diize will illustrate the administrative burden that captains struggle with during every port call. But also the solution to simplify administration and complete it up to 7.5 times faster.

Let’s check a standard voyage of the Black Pearl ship visiting three ports in Europe in a regular week. The Black Pearl with its 20 crew members and loaded with liquid bulk the voyage starts with a planned visit to the port of Rotterdam at Tuesday in the morning. 24 hours before entering the port, the captain has to process the part call administration.

Planning and navigating to enter the port safely

In this case, the captain must complete a spreadsheet with approximately 803 fields in 6 documents. Any errors in the administration can cause a delay or a penalty. This process takes approximately 2-3 hours. Shortly after completion of the administration, the most intensive part of the voyage begins: planning, navigating and continuously aligning in order to enter the port safely.

After discharging / loading again, the Black Pearl departures the port of Rotterdam and set the course for visiting the port of Antwerp. This is a fairly short trip and therefore, the port call administration has to be handed fairly quickly, even before the Black Pearl has left the port of Rotterdam.

Completing port call administration

To complete the administration, this time around 436 fields within 10 tabs have to be completed. This takes about 2 hours of administration, with more or less all the same information, but in different formats.

For example, the nationality format should be expressed in the ISO 3166-2 code, like “PH” or “NL” instead of the country name, such as “Philippines” or “Netherlands” (Rotterdam). Fortunately, none of the crew members have health issues; otherwise another 11 fields had to be filled in per ill/recovered crew member.

Port visit and ship-to-ship activities

The port visit went smoothly and several ship-to-ship activities were executed, like the bunkering operation

The port visit went smoothly and several ship-to-ship activities were executed, like the bunkering operation. On day 4, the voyage continues, this time a visit to the port of Immingham is planned. It’s a trip of 313 nautical miles. Again 24 hours prior to arrival the captain has to handle the port call administration.

This time 852 fields has to be completed divided into 6 documents and 8 tabs. And again, the same information but in a different format, for example this time the Nationality should be expressed in the ISO 3166-3 code.

In this case it will be “PHL” and “NLD”. After more than 2.5 hours of administration, the captain has a short moment of rest, with just a brief moment of peaks ahead of them to navigate the ship into the port safely and on time.

diize’s Always on Board application

Above illustrated was just one regular week of port visits. This means during one year, with about 100 port calls to make, will result in over 200 hours of administration, completing 60K+ fields divided into 400+ documents and 750+ tabs.

At diize, they wondered why there is no smoother process to complete the administration. In the end, more or less the same information is handled and only a fraction of the time changes. And that’s why they build Always on Board, based on their maritime and digital expertise.

All information is securely stored in one application

Always on Board is the easiest way to process the port call administration

With Always on Board, all information is securely stored in one application, and depending on the port, the correct formats will be submitted.

Always on Board is the easiest way to process the port call administration. Captains can process the administration in less than 20 minutes and achieve time savings of 85%.

It offers a solution that meets industry standards like low bandwidth functionality and use of the latest local port documentation.

Always on Board application is directly usable

After configuration of all ship- and crew details, the solution is directly usable.

Only a short instruction and walk through is sufficient to start. No need for special hardware or software installations.