The cost of UKHO raster charts?

Huttoft

Huttoft

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Hello.
Can anyone enlighten me as to why some charting companies such as Belfield or Memory Map and probably others, can sell me software plus all the up to date UK and Ireland raster charts ( about 800 in total) for as little as £40 or £50, when the official Admiralty chart distributors will charge me either £15 for an individual raster chart or £10 per chart if I buy 10 or more at the same time? To buy all the charts for the UK and Ireland would cost about £8000 at those rates. As far as the charts being up to date, Belfield as an example, issues updated charts every quarter.
I hope I've got the numbers right, 'cos they seem weird, but I've just been checking their sites and that's what it looks like.
 
UKHO is probably trying to run as a "Cost Centre" where all department costs are "recovered" from sales of charts. The other companies are exactly that, commercial organisations where a competitve price for charts has to be met by a business-like trimming of all costs & overheads. It's a significant difference in the approach to costs & pricing & illustrates why Government departments are seldom competetive.
 
Huttoft said:
Hello.
Can anyone enlighten me as to why some charting companies such as Belfield or Memory Map and probably others, can sell me software plus all the up to date UK and Ireland raster charts ( about 800 in total) for as little as £40 or £50, when the official Admiralty chart distributors will charge me either £15 for an individual raster chart or £10 per chart if I buy 10 or more at the same time?
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The UKHO is a branch of the MoD which, as has already been said, has been set up to operate as a Trading Fund. It's something of a politically motivated 'commercial' illusion, as the UKHO pays no taxes or business rates etc. In the real world it would not survive very long.

There are claims that the UKHO is completely taxpayer-independent, yet it is still paying back a huge taxpayer-funded loan which was deemed necessary to get the operation started. Form your own conclusions ...

Their main apparent revenue stream comes from selling paper charts back to the MoD (i.e. themselves) - I kid you not, check their accounts - but as we further enter the electronic charting age in an atmosphere of austerity, they can no longer continue to operate in the same monopolistic dictatorial manner. At least one deal has been set up with a commercial outlet to generate a portfolio of UK charts for around £30, which makes it competitive with the folios you mention.

See: http://www.visitmyharbour.com/charts-for-seaclear.asp for the DVD, and:
http://www.visitmyharbour.com/encrypted-usb-dongle.asp for the CD or dongle versions.
 
From what I have heard, the mindset of the UKHO is directed to big ships rather than the leisure market.

I think the problem is that the big ships might also realise that there are cheaper options available.

Mind you, it does seem bizarre that VisitMyHarbour can be selling the complete set of UK charts for that price - and presumably making a profit.
 
EasyCharts

electrosys said:
...At least one deal has been set up with a commercial outlet to generate a portfolio of UK charts for around £30, which makes it competitive with the folios you mention.

See: http://www.visitmyharbour.com/charts-for-seaclear.asp for the DVD, and:
http://www.visitmyharbour.com/encrypted-usb-dongle.asp for the CD or dongle versions.
Click to expand...

I use EasyCharts on my PC - all Admiralty charts for the UK and Ireland plus a simple but adequate (imho) chart plotting and tidal prediction program. Cost a little less than £70. I really like them.

What I don't know is whether you can use the charts so obtained with another plotter; I suspect not or at least you'd have to do a lot of hacking and probably be in breach of the licence.
 
The civil serpents who run the MOD have little concept of how commercial operatios actually funtion. Some years ago I needed a quote for the hire of an MOD owned plane for some trials. The response was the equivalent of going to Hertz etc and being told that the hire cost was £X per day plus £mega X for servicing as no other numpty was expected to hire it between your quote being issued and the hire starting.

As you may guess we found another supplier.

The great reality is civil serpents do not undersand commerce, business and normal accounting and as a result get any foray into the real world hopelessly wrong which is why denationalisation of almost every trading aspect of government is essential. The railways may be ****, but I can remember BR and they were worse than ****. Nationalised electricty and gas were the worst rip off ever, and whilst the present regime may have it's faults it is still streets ahead of the old nbationalised industries which would now be bleeding us dry if they had a chance.

Quite clearly the model they are using to run Droggies empire is flawed and needs changed to both give the RN the charts they need, the primary objective but also to provide commercial charts at competitive prices whilst recovering costs in an equably manner.
 
maxi77 said:
The great reality is civil serpents do not undersand commerce, business and normal accounting and as a result get any foray into the real world hopelessly wrong which is why denationalisation of almost every trading aspect of government is essential. The railways may be ****, but I can remember BR and they were worse than ****. Nationalised electricty and gas were the worst rip off ever, and whilst the present regime may have it's faults it is still streets ahead of the old nbationalised industries which would now be bleeding us dry if they had a chance.
.
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It's strange how different people have quite different recollections of the same things.

The current problem with the railways is not so much the ownership but the incredibly complex web of contracts between all the different players now required to make it work. The result is a huge increase in costs. The current arrangements cost the country roughly 3 times as much as BR did.

It's a similar story with energy supply. My 30 years employment in the Electricity Supply Industry divided almost exactly 50:50 between nationalised and privatised, and I have no doubts as to which was more efficient and cheaper. The old Electricity Boards were charged with breaking even, year on year - and did so. Now there are extra hands in the till - shareholders' divi's. and "private sector norm" boardroom bonanzas. And that's before thinking about the cost of setting up the "open competition" system with Settlements et al: £1,000m admitted to officially, more likely 3 times that in reality, which would have paid for quite a few major power stations. Oh yes, power stations: all our major stations were built under nationalisation, the private sector has built almost none: there's little incentive since scarcity puts the prices up and nobody's responsible any more for ensuring the lights stay on.

Progress? Aye, right.
 
Got a bit of an insight since I used to be a member of the UKHO consultive committee - though the idea of having a consultative committee says a lot anyway! :)

The UKHO are focussed on the big ship market and to them that means a network of chart agents is needed. So they maintain a distribution system and price levels that support that network. The big shipping companies wont / cannot use the likes of Belfield - to them a few hundreds on a new set of charts is neither here nor there.And if you are in the happy position that a part of the market will pay 10 times the price that the rest pay, you concentrate on that bit and dont pollute the market by discounting

Its a bit like the way that car main dealers can charge a fortune for service because big companies dont shop round for service on their car fleets. Or BA can charge silly prices for first class / club class air tickets.

As for their staff, the UKHO long ago recruited commercial staff from outside the civil service
 
It appears to me that UKHO are simply not really interested in supplying directly to the leisure market, but are quite happy to offer licences at reasonable cost to companies who choose to market their digital data to us in packaged format.

I can't see the problem?

Vic
 
The 'Admiralty' made £9m last year,and £8m the year before last, selling charts that were surveyed when?Have a look at the last survey date on your chart.Rip off.Your chart was probably surveyed by a bloke with a sextant,a wind up watch and a lead line,whose wages were paid by the Navy,ie tax payers money.While I'm at it,why doesn't the 'Admiralty' offer a 'pick and mix' option on their 'Lesiure charts'?
We are still buying last centuaries knowledge, off the people we have allready paid.
Cheers
 
DaveS said:
It's strange how different people have quite different recollections of the same things.

The current problem with the railways is not so much the ownership but the incredibly complex web of contracts between all the different players now required to make it work. The result is a huge increase in costs. The current arrangements cost the country roughly 3 times as much as BR did.

It's a similar story with energy supply. My 30 years employment in the Electricity Supply Industry divided almost exactly 50:50 between nationalised and privatised, and I have no doubts as to which was more efficient and cheaper. The old Electricity Boards were charged with breaking even, year on year - and did so. Now there are extra hands in the till - shareholders' divi's. and "private sector norm" boardroom bonanzas. And that's before thinking about the cost of setting up the "open competition" system with Settlements et al: £1,000m admitted to officially, more likely 3 times that in reality, which would have paid for quite a few major power stations. Oh yes, power stations: all our major stations were built under nationalisation, the private sector has built almost none: there's little incentive since scarcity puts the prices up and nobody's responsible any more for ensuring the lights stay on.

Progress? Aye, right.
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Over the years I have workeded for suppliers to both BR and MOD. BR procurement services actually made the MOD procurement look good. The big problem today is that Railtrack was renationalised by the back door by Bliar and has ripped the consumer and the TOCs off ever since. Yes the model is over complex and that was the Tories fault but the railways would have collapsed without privatisation.

As for energy supply if that were still nationaised we would be paying double what we pay now and probably suffering brownouts and gas shortages to boot.
Fundamentally governments and civil serpents should not be allowed anywhere near any comercial activty ever. Yes they can make the rules, enforce them etyc but for every ones sake keep them away from the money or they will waste it.
 
Seeing as the UKHO is owned by the public and we pay thier saleries, train the RN officers who charge around our coasts donig surveys, why should I have to pay for something I have already paid for?

The USHO (or what ever its called?) publish charts for free, and thier data is collected, surveyed & processed by a publicly owned body, so why do still have to pay? Same with the Met Office charging for stuf you already pay taxes for them to produce in the first place!
 
jdc said:
I use EasyCharts on my PC - all Admiralty charts for the UK and Ireland plus a simple but adequate (imho) chart plotting and tidal prediction program. Cost a little less than £70. I really like them.

What I don't know is whether you can use the charts so obtained with another plotter; I suspect not or at least you'd have to do a lot of hacking and probably be in breach of the licence.
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There is a review underway at present in the 'hallowed halls' about bringing Copyright legislation into the 21st century - aimed principally at the music and film markets - to enable people to legally transfer copyright-protected data into alternative formats (which at present is verbotten). The idea being that providing you have paid royalties on the data in one form, you will then be legally permitted to convert it into whatever format you choose.
I assume (hope) that the same principle will apply to all 'works of art and creativity'.
 
Ariadne said:
Seeing as the UKHO is owned by the public and we pay thier saleries, train the RN officers who charge around our coasts donig surveys, why should I have to pay for something I have already paid for?

The USHO (or what ever its called?) publish charts for free, and thier data is collected, surveyed & processed by a publicly owned body, so why do still have to pay? Same with the Met Office charging for stuf you already pay taxes for them to produce in the first place!
Click to expand...

On the other hand why should all UK tax payers pay for your charts, many will think you should pay your own share of that rather than sponging of them.
 
maxi77 said:
On the other hand why should all UK tax payers pay for your charts, many will think you should pay your own share of that rather than sponging of them.
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It would be worth doing the exercise to find out the cost of selling the charts - and if the price we pay covers the cost of maintaining that cost.
 
fireball said:
It would be worth doing the exercise to find out the cost of selling the charts - and if the price we pay covers the cost of maintaining that cost.
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I suspecct UKHO have a bit of paper that justifies their prices and the various government audit organisations do not seem to pick on them. Mind you see my comments above about government accounting practices, there sums may well not add up to normal people.
 
maxi77 said:
On the other hand why should all UK tax payers pay for your charts, many will think you should pay your own share of that rather than sponging of them.
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So why should I help to pay for my neighbour's kid's schooling ? It's simply the way the collective tax/ social benefits system works.

What I don't quite see is why I should have to pay for new charts as a result of an private energy company planting a large number of wind turbines off Skegness, with the UKHO cancelling their Chart 108 as a direct result.
 
Ariadne said:
Seeing as the UKHO is owned by the public and we pay thier saleries, train the RN officers who charge around our coasts donig surveys, why should I have to pay for something I have already paid for?
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You dont pay their salaries and you havent paid for the charts through taxes. UKHO belongs to the Crown. Its the govt who pay the salaries. You are simply a subject of the crown and one who is taxed at that. So you answer to the government and to the Crown and not the other way round.

And that isnt just political bias. If you are a freeholder you may think that you own the land your house is on. You dont. The ultimate owner of all land in England an Wakes is the Crown. You hold an estate in land.

We are not citizens but subjects.
 
Bosun Higgs said:
You dont pay their salaries and you havent paid for the charts through taxes. UKHO belongs to the Crown. Its the govt who pay the salaries. You are simply a subject of the crown and one who is taxed at that. So you answer to the government and to the Crown and not the other way round.

And that isnt just political bias. If you are a freeholder you may think that you own the land your house is on. You dont. The ultimate owner of all land in England an Wakes is the Crown. You hold an estate in land.

We are not citizens but subjects.
Click to expand...

By the way its Wales not wakes!

A country by its own right (not a pricipality as some wrongly believe) with its own national identity and one of the oldest languages and national flags in Europe. Far older than the Union flag (or the English language) on which we are not represented as we didn't sign the act of the union.

Anyway, I thought the Cof E owned all the land, well the bits the landed gentry didn't steal or have to give back! And either way it's still been paid for by taxes and as taxpayer you have already contributed to it being produced. So why should you pay again?

Should I start doffing my hat when a member of the civel service walks past (as they are the crowns agents), or can I continue to ignore them?
 
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