What other Country licenses’ are available to holders of USMerchant Mariners tickets, without starting all over again at the bottom.
I hold US Master 1600, Oceans with Towing. I have Dual citizenship with the UnitedKingdom (British), and was wonderingwhat other license would be available to me.
Of course an example is the Vanuatu license, but are their others? Can you simply get an EU country’s mariners licensebased upon your USCG STCW license?
And last but not least what exactly is the process for a Vanuatulicense and why would you want one?
You can likely get a UK MCA CEC (Certiificate of Equivalent Competency) which is the same. You will have to qualify and test to get their CoC. The UK MCA website should help/
You can also apply to Marshall Islands and Cayman Islands for their equivalent licenses. Websites very clear on requirements.
[QUOTE=+A465B;88247]You can likely get a UK MCA CEC (Certiificate of Equivalent Competency) which is the same. You will have to qualify and test to get their CoC. The UK MCA website should help/
You can also apply to Marshall Islands and Cayman Islands for their equivelent licenses. Websites very clear on requirements.[/QUOTE]
For a UK COEC / CEC you will need to take a class for their Business & Law component and then sit MCA oral exams. Cayman Islands needs Business & Law as well but that is a self test booklet. Easy. Marshall Islands is straight forward and Panama should be as well. However, you normally only do this if you have been hired for a foreign flag vessel first…
[QUOTE=Fid;88294]For a UK COEC / CEC you will need to take a class for their Business & Law component and then sit MCA oral exams. Cayman Islands needs Business & Law as well but that is a self test booklet. Easy. Marshall Islands is straight forward and Panama should be as well. However, you normally only do this if you have been hired for a foreign flag vessel first…[/QUOTE]
Thank you everyone for the replies, and I am interested in anymore ideas.
I am looking at semi retirement in about two years, after 30 years of OSVs and Tugs, it is time to spend a little more time at home. Since I will not want to totaly quit work, I thought I would look at trip work. And I figured as many certificates as I can get, including foreign could only help with trip work.
It looks like a Cayman or such license may be best, as it probably would be expensive to fly to the UK for oral exams., Or any more ideas?
Unless you plan to work on a UK flagged vessel you don’t need a UK CoC or CeC.
If you get a job on some other flagged vessel, the maritime authority of that flag will tell you what you need and how to apply for it. Most will not issue a license endorsement “on spec” because each one is based on the type of vessel and its manning requirements. Sometimes you can get an endorsement for service at a higher level, sometimes at a lesser level than your license covers here. Each application is considered on its merits and the vessel you are hired on …
The USCG license is accepted by most flag states as the underlying Certificate of Competency. If you get a job on a foreign flag vessel, most foreign flags require you to have an endorsement from their flag administration. Mostly, you just complete an application, send a copy of your US CoC (MMC), and of course some money. Usually, the employer will handle this. Some flags also require endorsements for your GMDSS license and possibly your SSO certificate. These endorsements are only valid as long as the underlying USCG credentials remain valid. Finally, a few flags have a requirement to pass some sort of exam on their flag state laws and procedures.
Many flag states will issue a letter immediately after receiving your endorsement application (and payment) stating that the endorsement application is being processed, and authorizing the applicant to sail for a few weeks on vessels under their flag until the actual endorsement is issued. Hence, if you are offered a job on a foreign flag vessel, the lack of an endorsement does not usually hold you up. For this reason, it rarely makes sense to get a foreign flag endorsement in advance. One possible exception would be if you intended to do temp work on commercial yachts. Then a Cayman endorsement might make sense since this is a major commercial yacht flag. The UK is not a major yacht flag in comparison, so the expense of obtaining the UK CoEC probably does not make sense (as stated above).