Warren – I am going to address this to you because you are one of the top posters on this forum and I know you are passionate about the BVI. I also know Alec has had private conversations with you and has answered several of your questions in private. Some questions and conversations just are not appropriate for a group discussion. I am directing this statement to you in hopes that we can have an honest conversation.

First off, Alec apologized for his comment and generalization that he made the other day. We all make mistakes and I hope you can understand that.

You responded to Alec and said, "Given the statistically insignificant number of balls and users, you can’t extrapolate anything." This goes both ways. The assumption that most boaters only use the app because they are forced to is also a generalization.

You also said in your previous post that "The BVI does not need to be tailored to the infrequent users to the detriment of the rest of us." This seems to be a common sentiment among several on this forum. However, that strikes me as an odd statement from someone who benefits off of those infrequent users. Most boaters are lucky if they can make it down to the BVI once or twice a year.

Several on this forum are fortunate enough to own boats that they charter out. Whether you like it or not, these infrequent visitors are the ones that charter your boats and help keep the economy going. How many of those infrequent boaters truly have the knowledge and skillset needed to captain a boat like Scuba Doo? Do you really want these infrequent captains that charter your boats dropping anchor in the middle of a mooring field like Christo observed the other day or tying up to a mooring that has not been checked in years?

It is pretty clear that the BVI government and businesses welcome these infrequent users and so do the charter companies. We can debate on if this is good or not for the BVI but I do not see this dynamic changing anytime soon which means we either embrace it or we do not. Regardless, I think we can all agree that there needs to be more moorings in the BVI so that people of all skillsets have a safe place to spend the night.

The most common complaint on this forum is that BoatyBall is converting existing moorings. Several have stated on this forum that if we added additional moorings that they would be supportive of the program. As we have stated numerous times, BoatyBall would like to see additional moorings in the BVI as well.

However, the choice to add additional moorings is not a BoatyBall decision. The local businesses are the one who have to apply for new moorings and then spend the money to pay for the taxes, hardware, maintenance, and insurance for the moorings. One of our goals at BoatyBall is to simplify and ensure the payment to the local businesses and make investing in moorings balls attractive for the locals.

The good news is that every mooring ball owner we are working with wants to add additional moorings. Adding additional moorings is an arduous process and takes time. However, after talking with the owners we are confident that boaters will be seeing additional moorings in some of the most popular bays over the next 12 – 18 months. Hopefully that is some good news for those on this forum.

To imply that "Alec and BoatyBall don't care about the views of the people that are in this forum" is not correct. We would not be engaged with this group and forum if we did not care. In fact, just the other day you encouraged BoatyBall to be more vocal on this forum.

You also indicated that you could support BoatyBall if we addressed a few items. One of those items was increased communication with this forum. We are committed to trying to engage this group and to continue to gather feedback from some of the most experienced boaters in the BVI.

You asked us to address our cancellations policy. You have stated that once a boater makes a reservation they might end up doing something not safe in order to try and keep a reservation. BoatyBall has a no cancellation policy; however, we are reasonable people and we have refunded every boater that has contacted us with a legitimate concern. If a boater contacts us with a safety concern we will ALWAYS refund them. Period!

The third item you said you would like for us to address is the need to be able to reserve multiple nights. This is a great suggestion and one that we are working on. We hope that by addressing these concerns that we will some day earn your support.

We do appreciate this forums feedback. Understanding your concerns have helped us make better decisions and changes to the app. We know we will never please everyone but we would like to try.

We do appreciate everyone’s feedback and we are listening.