What does it mean "pay as you sail" for shipping companies?

For shipping companies, whose geography of navigation is extensive and not limited to a certain region, the issue of buying and using electronic navigational charts (ENC) is an acute issue. Moreover, the lack of updated versions of the ENC on any ECDIS (Electronic Chart Display and Information System) on the vessel can lead to huge costs. For example, a ship may simply not be allowed to leave the port. There is an unspoken rule of port services, according to which the lack of charts updates during more than 4 weeks can cause restrictions on leaving the port, which lead to enormous costs for the shipping company.

The cost of ENC also varies depending on the region and charts details. It can be as much as $ 5 (Australia) for 3 months of use, or $ 600 (China) for a year of using it . Each vessel is equipped with an ECDIS navigation system. The task of buying and updating charts is the task of the managers of the shipping company. Very often, charts can be bought in advance, before the departure of the vessel along the route, and sent to the ship. But the final route of the vessel's movement does not always coincide with the planned one, due to weather conditions or a change in plans for the delivery of goods. Therefore, buying charts in advance may not always be the right and profitable decision. In order to avoid such a situation, ships are using the PAYS (pay-as-you-sail) system.

Captain, the vessel is plotting a route using software on ECDIS and/or Route Planner. Next, the route is saved in RTZ format and sent to the ENC provider. Provider in return sends a collection of up-to-date ENC necessary for use along the route and the captain uploads them to ECDIS. Payment is made for the provided charts.

A collection of ENC for a specific sailing region (or the whole collection) is pre-downloaded and uploaded to ECDIS. The collection of charts is updated as needed either through special equipment or by email. Payment is made based on the history of the location of the vessel (track) - which ENC was used along the route, for it payment is made.

PAYS is a service that allows you to pay for the ENCs that were used during the voyage. There is no need to plan a route in advance and request charts for the ship. When PAYS is connected to the ship, the captain receives all the necessary ENCs (if the navigation region is fixed and known in advance, the ship receives charts only for this navigation region). During the voyage, the chart provider receives information about the vessel's route and, as a result, issues an invoice for the ENCs used.

Often PAYS is the part of more complicated vessel systems, like route-planner or vessel management system (Navi-Planner from Transas)

We at Marine Digital provide PAYS both as part of a route planner or fuel optimization system, or as a stand-alone solution.

Among the features of the work of our system are:

• the ability to select the sailing region of the vessel
  
• loading ENC for sailing region
  
• control of the vessel's location in the sailing region
  
• automatically download ENC if the vessel is near the sailing region border
  
• informing the ship manager about the potential sailing region departure
  

PAYS from Marine Digital is not only a system for transferring ENCs to a vessel, but also a convenient interface for a shipowner / shipping company to keep track of which ENCs were delivered to the vessel, how long they are valid (charts are provided for a period of minimum of 3 months) and what invoices were issued.

There is no need to install additional equipment on board to use the PAYS system. It is enough to have a computer in order to send the necessary charts. If necessary, additional equipment can be installed on the vessel as part of the implementation of a fuel optimization and monitoring system for the vessel's performance, then the charts will be sent to it. In this case, the captain only needs to insert a USB-drive and transfer the received charts to ECDIS. One of the advantages of Marine Digital PAYS is the various payment methods for charts and the service itself. Monthly cost is 70 euros including planning fee, plus tracking fee.

Аdvantage of Fuel Optimization System from Marine Digital:

Marine Digital FOS can be integrated with other system and third-party's solutions through the API. To implement vessel performance monitoring for any vessel, we are using mathematical algorithms, machine learning and the same equipment as in FOS. The more data we collect from vessels, the more precise reports and recommendations our system will perform according to your individual requirements in fleet management.

If you have any questions about the solutions and the Marine Digital System platform, write to us, we will be happy to answer

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