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The charity making life better by water
Making life better by water
These are boats that are used primarily for community or educational use.
There are many boats on our waterways that are used primarily for community or educational use. The majority are operated as trip or hire boats, with a few trading boats and even one that moors up in different locations to offer children's play activities.
Please refer to the guidance notes that apply to the use that you want to make of the boat and complete the relevant operating proposal form.
Do not commit financially to your proposed business before receiving our ‘in principle' approval.
As a charity ourselves, it is important for us to make sure that any organisation receiving a discount or subsidy from us in respect of a boating operation must be using that boat to deliver our charitable objectives.
We are working to produce a clear set of guidelines and criteria that will help us to determine which boats we may subsidise and those that we should not. Whilst this work is ongoing we will continue to use the 'old' charitable discount and criteria as set out below.
There is a 60 per cent discount off the business licence fee providing that all of the following requirements are met:
This discount will be the subject of further review and consultation.
We have now launched a new edition of the Boater's Handbook in partnership with the Environment Agency.
First published in 2002, the handbook is written for boat owners and hirers and contains lots of 'getting started' tips, as well as important information about how to boat safely.
The updated handbook contains some new information on waterway dimensions. There are also pointers on the extra factors owners and hirers of wide beams need to be aware of when navigating and mooring.
The Handbook was originally commissioned by British Waterways in partnership with the Environment Agency and the British Marine Federation. An expert group was commissioned to develop key messages and content, drawing on other published sources and relevant empirical evidence. Since then, there have been several re-prints which incorporated best practice updates.
Download it below, or order a free hard copy from the online shop.
If you are a new or existing customer and wish to set up a new hire boat, you must submit an operating proposal using your boat licence account on our online system.
Please provide as much information as possible for us to assess your proposal.
For the assessment of new Operating Proposals there is a non-refundable fee towards our administration and initial assessment costs. The fee is to be paid online to progress your application and will be applicable for all submissions received from 1 December 2023 onwards.
The fees for each operating proposal are:
Upon receipt of your submitted proposal, you will receive email confirmation and reference number. We will then aim to give you an in principle decision within six weeks. Please note that you may need to obtain planning permission and negotiate agreements for using our property which could take much longer to finalise.
Do not commit financially to your proposed business before receiving our ‘in principle' approval.
Last Edited: 02 November 2023
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