Restricted use of marina engineers

[Old Tim]

My marina has recently introduced a requirement that any engineering work on boats not undertaken by the owner must be undertaken by the marina’s named engineer, and a fee of £50 per day will be levied if this engineer is not used. No charge will be levied for work undertaken by an outsider if such work is beyond the scope of the marina engineer.

 

As this approach precludes me from choosing between engineers in order to find the best deal - as well as ‘fining’ me if I do not comply – is it legal or is it contrary to competition regulations? Is this approach now an industry standard?

 

I have enjoyed mooring at this marina for the last 35 plus years, but resent this change which seems to reduce my autonomy – let alone reducing the work that is available to outside contractors - solely to increase the revenue of the marina owners. I have raised the issue with the marina management but to no avail.

 

I would very much like to hear the experiences of fellow boaters on this matter, and would welcome their guidance.

[Tonka]

8 minutes ago, Old Tim said:

My marina has recently introduced a requirement that any engineering work on boats not undertaken by the owner must be undertaken by the marina’s named engineer, and a fee of £50 per day will be levied if this engineer is not used. No charge will be levied for work undertaken by an outsider if such work is beyond the scope of the marina engineer.

 

As this approach precludes me from choosing between engineers in order to find the best deal - as well as ‘fining’ me if I do not comply – is it legal or is it contrary to competition regulations? Is this approach now an industry standard?

 

I have enjoyed mooring at this marina for the last 35 plus years, but resent this change which seems to reduce my autonomy – let alone reducing the work that is available to outside contractors - solely to increase the revenue of the marina owners. I have raised the issue with the marina management but to no avail.

 

I would very much like to hear the experiences of fellow boaters on this matter, and would welcome their guidance.

You book the engineer you want and then they work on the boat outside of the marina 

[Quattrodave]

Wow thats a shitty one.... hmmm ref its legality i don't know, my first thought is that you signed the marina ts & cs but that doesnt make it 'right' does it... my guess is there is probably some legislation somewhere that you could use to argue it but how much it would cost yo fight it and how long you'd still be in marina for aftwards....

 

Good shout by Tonka, just work outside the marina 🤷‍♂️

Edited June 27, 2024 by Quattrodave

[David Mack]

If they are going to allow other tradesmen to work in their marina they are entitled to take reasonable steps to ensure that the tradesman is insured and not a risk to the marina itself or to the other boats moored there and is not going to cause undue disturbance to marina staff, other moorers or neighbours. It follows that they can make a reasonable charge for verifying the tradesman's status. Whether £50 per day is a reasonable charge in the circumstances is a matter that could ultimately only be determined by a court.

The easy answer, as suggested above, is to have the work done outside the marina.

[Slim]

As I recall that clause (or something very similar) was written into my first marina contract some 30 years ago.. The contract itself was a based on a pro forma issued by a trade association for marina owners, can't begin to recall their correct title. Since the only outsider to work on my boat was the original builder carrying out snagging the daily levy was never an issue. 

 

So, not a new idea. 

[jonathanA]

A one off of 50 quid to check/manage an 'unknown' contractor could be considered OK, but 50 a day smacks of deliberately forcing you to use the in house guy. Although it could also be a way of making it possible to have some on site capability...

Slightly depends on whether his costs are competitive and his work is OK....  

 

If not then I'd be making a point of taking my boat out but only just outside, to have work done on it...

 

Or finding some requirement that he can't meet like being gas safe even if not actually required for the work...

Edited June 27, 2024 by jonathanA
Add paragraph

[Lady M]

My mooring agreement, since 1993, has always said this.

[nicknorman]

Unfortunately it is their land and their marina, they can say who is allowed to enter their property and under what terms. So there is no legal recourse. The recourse is to cough up, moor elsewhere, or as said take the boat out of the marina for the work to be done. That latter could be a bit of a problem if mains power is needed I suppose. But anyway, if there is lots of hammering, grinding, drilling, sawing etc then it is only courteous to other marina users to take it out of earshot.

[Bee]

This is quite common, In fact I would say it is unusual for 'outsiders' to work freely in Marinas.

[Arthur Marshall]

On the only occasion I wanted to move into a marina, I noticed this stipulation was in the contract. On the other hand, when I had to move the boat closer to where an engineer had his workshop, the owner of that marina had no objections, possibly because the bulk of the work was off site.

[IanD]

My marina has the same clause; if it's work that their onsite team can do then you can't bring somebody in, unless it's snagging/repairs by the builder. Their explanation is that they have (and pay for) the onsite team to provide services to boaters, and I think it's not unreasonable to require that they should be given the work if they can do it (and are available when needed).

 

They don't seem pernickety about this, Finesse were at the boat yesterday to do some work/tweaks/snagging and there were no objections to this -- though I'm not sure the onsite team would have been able to do some of it anyway, confronted with things like firmware updates/changes... 😉 

[Lady M]

There is more than one question here.  Firstly whether having a restriction is common and reasonable.  Then what happens about bringing in an outside contractor for a service that is offered by the marina.  Is there a complete ban or can it be arranged subject to a fee?  My mooring agreement requires advance permission for all but minor work and states when permission is unlikely to be withheld.  So it is quite flexible but permission may be withheld;  no mention of any fee.

[nicknorman]

I suppose it is a little bit like going into a pub but taking in your own beer to drink. It wouldn't seem unreasonable for the publican to object.

[Peanut]

The contract clause probably comes from British Marine, the trade body, union, who represents the marine industry. Our marina requires tradesmen to report to the office, they can check on insurance and keep out those with a poor reputation. There can make a charge of 15% on the invoice, which isn't applied often.

Though they are quick to take on any insurance work, as any competitive quote would cost more as they will add 15% to the bill.

[MtB]

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

I suppose it is a little bit like going into a pub but taking in your own beer to drink. It wouldn't seem unreasonable for the publican to object.

 

Particularly if you asked for a glass to put it in!

 

But there is a precedent. Any decent restaurant will be happy for you to bring your own wine, and they will charge you a "corkage" fee for serving it. Possibly quite a high fee as they'll need to replace the profit on the wine you might otherwise have bought from the restaurant to drink instead of yours. Perfectly reasonable in my view.

 

 

[Tim Lewis]

11 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Particularly if you asked for a glass to put it in!

 

But there is a precedent. Any decent restaurant will be happy for you to bring your own wine, and they will charge you a "corkage" fee for serving it. Possibly quite a high fee as they'll need to replace the profit on the wine you might otherwise have bought from the restaurant to drink instead of yours. Perfectly reasonable in my view.

 

 

I can honestly say that I cannot ever remember going into a licensed restaurant that allowed you to bring your own alcohol in!

[MtB]

2 minutes ago, Tim Lewis said:

I can honestly say that I cannot ever remember going into a licensed restaurant that allowed you to bring your own alcohol in!

 

Its perfectly in order to take your own wine to good restaurants. They are not going to turn away a wine buff (or whole club of wine buffs wanting an evening out!) wanting to drink a specific wine not in the restaurant cellar. 

[nicknorman]

5 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Its perfectly in order to take your own wine to good restaurants. They are not going to turn away a wine buff (or whole club of wine buffs wanting an evening out!) wanting to drink a specific wine not in the restaurant cellar. 

You may well be right in the case of a proper posh restaurant, however most “restaurants” are chains, and I bet the the computer says no if the minimum wage staff ask it.

[IanD]

5 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Its perfectly in order to take your own wine to good restaurants. They are not going to turn away a wine buff (or whole club of wine buffs wanting an evening out!) wanting to drink a specific wine not in the restaurant cellar. 

 

However if they're licensed and allow you to bring wine in the corkage fee is likely to be pretty high, at least the retail price of the wine or maybe more since restaurant markups on wine are massive... 😞 

[Slim]

14 minutes ago, Tim Lewis said:

I can honestly say that I cannot ever remember going into a licensed restaurant that allowed you to bring your own alcohol in!

Did you ever ask.?

[GUMPY]

19 minutes ago, Tim Lewis said:

I can honestly say that I cannot ever remember going into a licensed restaurant that allowed you to bring your own alcohol in!

Le Mercury in Upper Street allowed us to bring our own champagne when we had our wedding reception there.

 

With no corkage either 

 

[Paul C]

2 hours ago, nicknorman said:

I suppose it is a little bit like going into a pub but taking in your own beer to drink. It wouldn't seem unreasonable for the publican to object.

 

What if you went into a motorway service station, brought your own sandwiches, sat down and eat them at one of their tables? And you'd paid £35 for overnight parking?

[MtB]

13 minutes ago, Paul C said:

 

What if you went into a motorway service station, brought your own sandwiches, sat down and eat them at one of their tables? And you'd paid £35 for overnight parking?

 

AND were having a bloke service your car out in the car park at the same time?!

 

 

[IanD]

19 minutes ago, GUMPY said:

Le Mercury in Upper Street allowed us to bring our own champagne when we had our wedding reception there.

 

With no corkage either 

 

I'm surprised, their markup on champagne is about 150% (still less than some places!) so they must have said goodbye to a massive chunk of money by doing that...

Edited June 27, 2024 by IanD

[nicknorman]

11 minutes ago, Paul C said:

 

What if you went into a motorway service station, brought your own sandwiches, sat down and eat them at one of their tables? And you'd paid £35 for overnight parking?

I think motorway service stations are a bit different because the catering is provided by other businesses and the seating is often not particularly linked to any one business. Anyway, the point of a motorway service station is to provide a service, eg it is quite OK to use the toilet without buying anything. This will be enshrined in the original permission to build the service station.

 

Your addition of the £35 suggests this happened to you, but I think that is abnormal for a UK motorway service station