Ship Ownerst vessels have been provided with ISF Watchkeeper system which allows each crew member to record his work and rest hours. The program of bgi manual is based on the ‘Minimum hours of rest’ and will show up breach of rest hours at any given time during the working period in the past 24 hours. Each crew member, including the Master & Riding gang members, shall maintain their rest hour record using this software.
The ISF Watchkeeper module has the options for IMO STCW 2010 and OPA 90. Masters shall ensure appropriate legislation is applied depending on vessel’s location; switch over to OPA 90 when vessel in US waters.
All officers and crew must enter in comments in the remarks section explaining reasons for noncompliances (if any) & shall receive a copy of the records pertaining to them, at the end of the month, which shall be endorsed by the Master or his nominee and the seafarer.
While it is the responsibility of each crew member to record his work and rest hours, the Master shall ensure the correctness of the records prior uploading it to the ISF Watchkeeper website.
Master shall upload the completed records on to the ISF Watchkeeper website on a weekly basis (preferably every Sunday) thus making it available for review by the Superintendent.
Records need to be kept for a period of three years and be available for inspection by the Flag State, Class and Port State inspections.
All crew members must be instructed to ensure all rest hour entries are factual and can be supported; you cannot have an entry showing an individual taking rest when records show otherwise. Examples:
A Chief Engineer’s record showing rest period when log entry shows bunkering operation was ongoing.
A Chief Officer’s record showing taking rest and cargo records show COW operation ongoing.
Ship Ownerst considers more than 2 instances of rest hour breach per individual in a month during the course of normal vessel operation as ‘significant non-compliance’.
References:
a) IMO STCW 2010
b) ILO MLC 2006
c) OPA 90 (refer to 46 CFR 15.1111)
d) OCIMF Publication Nov 2012 – Recommendations Relating to Application of Requirements Governing Seafarers’ Hours of Work & Rest.
e) Liberian Marine Notice MLC-003, Section 3.3 ‘Hours of Work and hours of rest’.
