SSR don’t accept digitally signed contracts

[mrming]

Forgot to transfer SSR at the time I bought the current boat.

Went to do it belatedly. All good until I supplied the Bill of Sale, which had been signed digitally by both parties using a service similar to DocuSign.

UK Ship Register said they will only accept a contract “signed in wet ink”.

Although I have a good relationship with the seller, I don’t think either of us have the time or energy to arrange that.

My response therefore has been that I’ll check in with them in a few years’ time to see if their policy has been updated.

I’ve been using digital contracts in my day job for nearly 10 years, so this seems backward and unnecessarily restrictive imo.

Posting here in case it trips anyone else up.

 

[Sandy]

Where government departments are involved there often needs to be primary legislation, I kid you not, to catch up with modern technology. As many MPs are lawyers they have only got used to the Biro pen and things take forever.

p.s. I was involved in changing something that needed to go through this process.

 

[mjcoon]

I was involved in attempting to standardise digital signing of electronic documents back at the end of the previous millennium, via ECMA wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecma_International. And GCHQ secretly invented public key cryptography before USA... All very sad!

 

[benjenbav]

Forgot to transfer SSR at the time I bought the current boat.

Went to do it belatedly. All good until I supplied the Bill of Sale, which had been signed digitally by both parties using a service similar to DocuSign.

UK Ship Register said they will only accept a contract “signed in wet ink”.

Although I have a good relationship with the seller, I don’t think either of us have the time or energy to arrange that.

My response therefore has been that I’ll check in with them in a few years’ time to see if their policy has been updated.

I’ve been using digital contracts in my day job for nearly 10 years, so this seems backward and unnecessarily restrictive imo.

Posting here in case it trips anyone else up.

A few years ago there was the same issue with the Land Registry.

The courts had approved digital signatures but the LR didn’t have the systems in place to protect themselves and their users against fraud.

They did develop appropriate procedures but, I think, at quite a bit of administrative cost.

I would guess that the SSR hasn’t had the resources to put appropriate procedures in place so far. Hopefully they are working on it.

 

[Mark-1]

This came up recently and it was stated you can just retrospectively write a Bill of Sale yourself from the template link on the SSR page.

If you don't feel comfortable with that just sell the boat to the wife for 30 seconds and buy it back using the template doc on the SSR page.

Mind you, I quite like your current plan.

 

[Biggles Wader]

Given that the SSR is not proof of ownership I can't really see why they are making such an issue over it.

 

[Stemar]

Do you think they'd notice if you signed it as MrMiing and MrsMing signed as A Seller, Esq?

 

[Irish Rover]

This seems strange to me. I registered on Part 1 in April. Everything was done online with UKSR and my BOS was signed digitally via docusign.

 

[jbweston]

Can you let the old registration expire and then simply get a new registration? I'm surprised you need to provide evidence of ownership beyond a simple statement that you are the owner. I'm not saying that's the law, only that ownership of a vessel not registered under part 1 passes to you on whatever basis your contract says (even in cases where the contract is oral and a handshake), often on payment and/or delivery, just like for a TV, car or lawnmower - so there are lots of us that undoubtedly own a boat but have no 'bill of sale' or anything like it.

I can't see how The UK Ships Register can think they can 'transfer' an SSR registration. I can see that they might not be willing to cancel the previous owner's registration without evidence. Possibly that's the problem. But it will expire and then you'll have a clean slate, provided you can wait that long.

 

[jdc]

The MCA recently introduced the concept of (and requirement that you do it) 'Claiming' your boat. I just received a letter from them telling me I had to do it before my SSR ran out (in Feb, so they gave me 3 months notice). It's fairly easy, but I had to:
1. Register on the website and create a log-in.
2. Put in the boat name and existing SSR and press 'claim'.
3. This prompted me for scans of the SSR, Photo-id (I used my passport) and proof of ownership (for which a scan of the invoice from the boat builder was good enough - no signatures on it).

I think that you can 'unclaim' a boat, and maybe you (the OP) should get the seller to 'unclaim' his boat before you claim it?

 

[Bouba]

This came up recently and it was stated you can just retrospectively write a Bill of Sale yourself from the template link on the SSR page.

If you don't feel comfortable with that just sell the boat to the wife for 30 seconds and buy it back using the template doc on the SSR page.

Mind you, I quite like your current plan.

Unfortunately it would take the wife only 15 seconds to sell the boat to a third party

 

[Wandering Star]

Unfortunately it would take the wife only 15 seconds to sell the boat to a third party

Possibly but provided the OP ensured she was locked on board at the point of sale, the OP could probably claim she be included as part of the inventory - potentially a win for the OP whatever the value of the boat?

 

[benjenbav]

Forgot to transfer SSR at the time I bought the current boat.

Went to do it belatedly. All good until I supplied the Bill of Sale, which had been signed digitally by both parties using a service similar to DocuSign.

UK Ship Register said they will only accept a contract “signed in wet ink”.

Although I have a good relationship with the seller, I don’t think either of us have the time or energy to arrange that.

My response therefore has been that I’ll check in with them in a few years’ time to see if their policy has been updated.

I’ve been using digital contracts in my day job for nearly 10 years, so this seems backward and unnecessarily restrictive imo.

Posting here in case it trips anyone else up.

I imagine that this wasn’t your point but, as others seem to be taking it literally, might I take the liberty of observing that it really wouldn’t take much effort (quite a lot less than some ingenious solutions that have been advanced) to print the bill of sale, sign it, post it to the seller with whom you are on good terms, with a request for them to countersign and post it back; finally post the fully signed item to the SSR.