Your licence renewal has been refused. What now?

In the report of the independent Commission on Boat Licensing, published by the Trust, 826 continuous cruiser renewals had been refused for failing the bona fide navigation requirement. Those were open cases at the time of writing. It is not a rare outcome, and it is not the end of the conversation.

What has actually been decided

The Trust has concluded that its record of your movement does not show a genuine progressive journey. That record is built from sightings recorded by licensing rangers — occasional observations, not a continuous track. You can see those sightings in your online licence account, apart from the most recent 28 days.

So the question is rarely whether you cruised. It is whether what the Trust saw supports the conclusion it drew.

What helps

• —Your own dated record of moorings, with positions
• —Photographs with dates and locations still in the image files
• —Receipts from boatyards, diesel, pump-outs and marinas along the route
• —Any correspondence where you told the Trust about a breakdown or a stoppage
• —Witnesses who saw the boat where you say it was

Records kept as you went carry more weight than anything assembled afterwards. That is not a technicality — it is the difference between an account and a reconstruction.

What to do first

Respond within whatever deadline the letter sets, even if only to say you are gathering evidence. Silence is read as agreement. Then get advice: the NBTA runs volunteer caseworkers who deal with exactly this, and they have seen far more of these cases than you have.

Do not stop paying or stop engaging while you dispute it. An unlicensed boat is a separate and more serious problem than a disputed renewal.