Refunds from Moorings?

We are scheduled to sail for a week from another Moorings base, but that base doesn't have a community like this one so I hope you don't mind if I ask here.

We are booked for August 29-September 5. We have put in a 35% deposit on the charter. Next month we will be faced with the decision as to whether or not to pay the balance.

I'm wondering if anyone has had luck in them not charging their usual cancellation penalty before the final payment is due.

Or a refund (not a credit) if they cancel your charter closer to do the date.

I would have no problem paying the balance if I knew I'd get it back if travel from the USA to Europe was prohibited when we were supposed to arrive, I just don't want to wind up with a $10k+ credit when it's next to impossible to schedule a week we can all go. We had planned this August trip two years ahead.

We have travel insurance but of course it won't cover this.

Thanks for any thoughts.

What is the Moorings telling you? In light of the current situation, I can't imagine that they would have a problem with you waiting to make your final payment. You still have plenty of time, so don't get in a hurry to make a decision that doesn't need to be made. Cross the bridge when you get there. I would think you are in the drivers seat, but I've been wrong before. A lot.

If they are offering a credit for future charters, take it. If travel reopens, you very likely can re-book same boat/time.

Based on their website, they're dealing with cancelled charters through 06/01. If you have a charter after that date, you are subject to their normal cancellation policies. We had to make the final payment this month to protect our July charter. I doubt that it will happen but Moorings has not yet cancelled it. We'll most likely do a reschedule to next July.

Moorings hasn't changed any of their policies for charters in August. I am worried that we'll wind up with a $10k credit that is hard to use (difficult to coordinate everyone on the trip to reschedule) or my parents (mid 60's) won't want to travel even if it's technically possible and we lose the money entirely.

This general topic has been discussed in other places on TTOL. Here's what I'll say - in general, its a horrible idea to just take a credit for future travel. That is nothing more than an unsecured loan to a company (Moorings) which may have zero value in the future. Reading your contract carefully is important - particularly with that dealing with Force Majeure (Acts of God including pandemic which was never specifically contemplated before). At some level, you'll have to make a bet with your own trip and funds.

I was in the exact same situation with Dream Yachts and got them to delay our final payment (in writing) and extend the period of time for which we had to make a decision with only a relatively small cancellation fee (500 Euro). I do appreciate their willingness to delay/modify in our case - it was certainly the right thing for them to do. I'd suggest you work hard with Moorings to modify their cancellation/deposit terms - keeping your deposit for several more weeks in an effort to defer your cancellation rather than just keeping the smaller cancellation penalty is very much in their favor (to be clear, that, too, is a free unsecured loan from you).

One last thing - I've heard someone say that Moorings is owned by private equity with significant funding. Let me clear about this - and I am personally involved with private equity and see its great benefits - you and others should not get strong positive feelings from its private equity ownership. They love that customers will provide free unsecured funding in terms of credits - I would too.

Here's what I'll also say - I do not see charter prices increasing in the future - in fact, I see them decreasing. Rebooking trips is likely to be easily done in the future, at lower prices. Sad, but true - unfortunately.

To clarify Breck, I indicated Moorings was owned by a private equity company and have experience with PE as well and said this WAS NOT a reason to get a credit....

I am not willing to take that risk personally

I may be wrong on this, but I am pretty sure this is actually not consideredForce Majeure/Act of God. The pandemic is, but the shutdown itself is by the government. At least that's my understanding from people who contacted social security about benefits/sick leave, etc. and were denied.

Does contract actually state there is "Force Majure" clause or is it implied? Most contracts I have reviewed state "nonrefundable" after a certain date, or similar language. It would be interesting to see exactly what the contract cancellation clause states.

I know this goes against what everyone is doing, but Navigare is offering a special until end of day. 50% off gift cards valid for 1 year. If you want to take a $10k trip, you can purchase a $5k gift card now and save the extra $5k. I get it, financing a charter company, etc but 100% return in 12 months is a pretty good financing deal.

Link to special.

Not being a lawyer I won't pretend to understand all the ramifications, but below is from their contract:

5.2 We also reserve the right to recall the yacht due to unexpected circumstances (e.g. severe weather conditions etc.) in which case we may give you a credit certificate for use on future charters, extend your charter, or cancel your charter. If we cancel your charter except for reasons beyond our control or as a result of your non-payment of any amounts due under the contract, you are entitled to receive a full refund of all monies paid. Notwithstanding the foregoing, no refund or compensation will be paid if your charter is cancelled due to unusual and unforeseeable circumstances beyond our control, the consequences of which could not be avoided even if all due carte had been exercised; such as (by way of example and not by way of limitation) war, riots, civil disturbances, industrial dispute, terrorist activity, natural or nuclear disaster, fire, adverse weather conditions, acts of God, unforeseeable technical problems with transport for reasons beyond our control or that of our suppliers, closed or congested ports, hurricanes and other actual or potential adverse weather conditions, flood, epidemics, health risks or pandemics or any other similar events or unforeseen circumstances that may amount to force majeure.

.....they forgot the kitchen sink.

I'd be worried they'd go out of business before I could travel!

I think I sent them the kitchen sink with the deposit.

This is our 14th charter with Moorings, going back to the days before they accepted credit cards. I know I'm putting a lot of faith in their ability to handle circumstances beyond their control. Based on our many years working with them, including a post-Irma charter in 2018, they've earned my trust.

I agree.

I agree, they've done well by us, not that others haven't. Over all, I'm happy with the all the bare boat charter operators in the BVI that we've patronized, and I'd take the credit - sometimes you just gotta have faith! Otherwise I feel like I'd be contributing to a self fulfilling professy.

So, my (very limited) understanding is that the situation of closed borders is not being considered as a force majeure. This comes from conversation (NB some secondhand) with departments such as Labour, NHI and SSB.

I was supposed to be sailing in Tahiti this week - that trip was canceled a month ago. MOORINGs gave me a credit. No refund. I had a week scheduled in BVIs for last week of July. I canceled that - and got another credit. No refund.

Is there a expiration date on the credits?

Seems like a pretty heavily weighted contract for the charter company. I think if we were to charter again, I'd cross off that section, sign it and see what happens. Basically as I read it, if ANYTHING happens that they can't control (including this current situation) they aren't under any obligation to refund or even offer a credit. Charging for a service that can't be provided is not a good way to do business.

We were sailing w/ the Moorings just before they locked down the BVI and ended up returning the boat a day early as we could feel things getting squirrelly. The Moorings gave us full credit for the last day, no issues. Very happy with how they handled the situation. Credit is good for 3 years.

Moorings just posted they're suspending all chargers up until 06/15. We're scheduled for 07/03 which I'm pretty sure Moorings will get around to cancelling in a couple of weeks. I know they're busy with rescheduling the suspended charters, but I'll be happy when they finally get to our dates so that we can plot out when we'll reschedule. That will probably be in the same time frame in 2021.

We were traveling with The Moorings for June 12th, however that obviously has been cancelled. They have suspended travel through June 15th. Our charter price was just over $10,000 and they wanted us to pay in full to allow us to change our charter dates without a change fee of $1,000. We did not pay in full because if we did and had to change again under their terms we would forfeit all $10,000. I am not willing to give them $10,000 for 13 months interest free and a possibility of losing it all. I was even offering to keep what was down on the deposit and pay the higher charter fee for next years pricing, but they would not do that either. Poor business practice when you cancel a trip, but still want the trip paid in full. There was no other date we could have gone till next year. I have chartered with Moorings for years, but may just have to leave and charter with another company next year.

A lot of places must be hurting for cash about now. Holding the proverbial gun to your loyal customers' heads is an odd way to solve that problem. In fact, the more that is done, the more it affirms your decision to not put any more of your money at risk.

Well...technically you are in violation of contract if you don’t pay your balance when it’s due. They could ask you to pay the whole charter fee in full at the time of booking but they don’t. They let us put down a “deposit” so we can get the boat we want for the dates we want. We had to do the same thing for our May charter, even though we knew there was no way it was going to go...but...because we were paid in full when the charter company canceled? We could move it with no added fees, etc. The only way to really avoid situations like this? Is to book at the last minute and just hope there are boats you like available - it is what it is - this is just a new scenario.

Steve - So you opted to allow them to keep the $3500+ deposit and didn't pay the balance?

If you paid by credit card then why don't you file a credit card dispute since they cant deliver?

Not sure you could dispute with cc company because you did not pay in full. We are in same situation for a June 19 charter ( they are still saying it will happen - haha). We also are long term moorings clients. So for next year - where else besides moorings to find a large power cat ( 4 cabin - bareboat)?

Marine Max was good to deal with. Nice location at Nanny Cay too.

Contact Virgin Charter Yachts located at Nanny Cay. They have a diverse selection of bareboat power cats to choose from. It’s a smaller company that gives great personalized service to their customers. We’ve chartered with them for years.

Moorings seems to be very short sighted with their approach.

Horizon Yacht Charters handled this situation properly.
Our contract with Horizon stated final "Full" payment due 45 days before the "Charter Start Date" June 10.
Since we obviously are not going to start our charter on June 10 that is no longer our "Charter Start Date".
We moved the charter to January 2021.
Out final payment is now due 45 days before our updated Charter Start Date on Jan 4.

I think this is a reasonable response and is what we did with Sea Tiger. Contract for horizon probably did not mandate this but moving charter out to new day with deposit moved as a credit, and not requiring final payment until closer to new charter date.

Ok a little update...As far as paying in full for a trip next year is not the prudent thing to do, because for some reason the situation comes up again and you have to cancel you are now out the $10,000+. Says so in the contract. As far as disputing with the CC Company we talked with them as a back up plan and they said if the Charterer cancels the trip they maybe able to get the deposit back. That was a maybe. The whole time I was dealing with the Moorings and made sure to point out we have been loyal customers for years now. I understand they are probably strapped for cash and need to keep those deposits. We did come to an agreement of taking a CNOTE (Moving our deposit) to next June, but paying the 2021 pricing instead of the 2020 pricing. I was ok with this since I got an early booking discount and a prepaid fuel option that we did not have for this year. So we will be all set for a 514PC on June 19, 2021.

I think Moorings is strapped because they are still paying the guaranteed payouts to the boat owners and need the charter credit to keep the game going. The only issue my CC company had was that the 1st deposit for this trip was done months ago but in the end the CC company credited back both payments for a trip that Moorings cancelled. Very loyal to Moorings for long time especially to their base camp employees--which they mostly layed off and are still out of work. Just unwilling to take the counter party risk with them.

When the dust settles we will be back unless of course Moorings doesn't want us because we wouldn't loan them interest free capital to fund their owner payments

One interesting outcome is we are seeing an uptick of interest in boating/slips at our local yacht club as people look for good outlets close to home

The Moorings made it through Irma/Maria. Granted that wasn't worldwide. They have very PE backing. The Moorings will be back.

Being world wide has diversity for most things, especially local disasters such as hurricanes. This pandemic is difficult economically for them as they cannot balance things out globally since globally there has been economic downfall globally.

Will Mooring survive?I think so. Not sure they will continue to pay out their guarantee income program but I hope so.

The discouraging thing is they have no control over their recovery. At least after Irma, once the base and boats were repaired, they were back in business. Same for property owners, both houses and hotels. With this pandemic, it's totally up to the government and airlines when people can come back, and travelers as to when they can afford and want to travel.

Agree. Personally (and as a physician) I think the news needs to emphasize HOW to properly wear mask and use hand sanitizer.

I watched the check out lady with "dirty hands (as she had touched many items, reach up to mask (Which was NOT covering nose), move mask some (ie depositing germs + possible virus onto mask), scratch her nose, and then back to next item of someone else (Possible transfer of HER virus to their items. She had no clue as to how her habits are NOT safe.

I personally can travel safely to by airplane as I know to hand Sanitizer before touching my mask and clean area around me upon arrival. Not 100% safe , but a safe way to do it.

Now IF BVI will open up borders, perhaps with restrictions.

For what it is worth I hope they survive as well...I just don't want to be concerned about it personally. I would point out that for Irma they gave us 2 trip refunds ASAP no questions asked. This was shortly after private equity company KKR bought Travelopia so they probably didn't have managerial influence yet. Travelopia owns Moorings and many other high end vacation companies. For IRMA it was relatively small exposure for Travelopia and KKR as they were globally diversified and possibly some of this was covered by business interruption insurance. In looking at the holdings for Travelopia now I cant see any that aren't affected majorly by this pandemic especially given Travelopia's concentration in high end travel.

To be fair to Moorings their rebooking policy is in line with all the other charter companies. Horizon is granting full refunds if the charter is more than 90 days out but that is their contractual policy for normal times. It’s going to be difficult for many companies to sell boats going forward given dropping payments on guaranteed contracts and the poor performance of shared revenue boats. The moorings is honoring their contracts both to owners and charterers. My contract is up in 60 days but I plan on another 5 year contract. Starting next year.
G

The charter companies are aligned with the boat owners. In game theory whenever you have 3 players 2 gang up on the 3rd. I found this out growing up as my 2 younger brothers who are bigger than me used to beat me up. As a charterer I don't want to be odd man out if the "shell game" of using charter loaned money to continue to pay the owners runs out and impacts the company solvency. I only have limited time to exercise a CC dispute and saw no downside to doing that and no upside to "loaning unsecured money" so boat owners can get their "guaranteed payments". There is no real certainty when the BVIs will even open and open without requiring either immunity proof or a self quarantine on island.

From my charterer perspective the situation is no different than Irma when full refunds were given because they couldn't fulfill the charter end of the "contract"

The situation is reversed for me with our rental property and I told our "odd man out" guests that if they cant get to it for any reason then they get their money back of which I have 1/2 that was fronted to me.

Hopefully they remember you the next time you try to book.

That will be interesting...I have a had a long and loyal relationship with them especially their Florida center and BVI base camp. Next time they may tell me to pound sand and go elsewhere....

I did send some of the returned money to some of their laid off base camps employees who were finally able to get it today

I have had extensive conversations with owners at two other charter companies. To say they are aligned with the owners might not be quite accurate. One of the companies seems almost hostile in their treatment of the owners. It’s a tough time for everyone. If the world does not open up soon it’s likely that when things start to return to normal travel and vacation costs will soar given the capacity that is going to be lost.
G

Interesting George...I wonder if business interruption insurance helped with Irma and the pandemic wasn't covered?

On vacation costs I wonder what this does for the demand side of things?

not covered for the pandemic.

Just like breaking your contracts should NOT be reimbursed by a cc company. All that does is increase the cc processing fees to the vendor which ultimately gets passed on the consumer. I hope every customer on this board that pays a higher charter fee next year remembers all the people on this board that used the credit cards companies as a scapegoat because they decided not to honor their contract agreements. Read those contracts next time and don't sign one if you don't agree with it. Save that spot and contract for someone who is honest up front and makes a real commitment.

Someone tries that crap with my reservations will not be welcome back and every other hotel in Cane will know about it.

Jason-

I can assure you I have read the contract many times over the years. I understand, appreciate, and respect how you feel. Your comments about "honesty" and "commitment" are off base but again that is certainly your opinion...nothing more and nothing less.

We can agree to disagree.

As I said I am on the other end (your end) of this with my rental property in the US and at the end of the day guests could do a credit card dispute with me as they have done in other homes. I have already told them all at the very beginning if they cant get to my place due to Covid, I am going to refund all monies and not hold them to the technical terms of their contract because IMHO I cant deliver on my end because they signed on to a specific week in their contract with me. If they do a dispute which is certainly within their rights I have no issue with them.

I have taken the credit instead of refund or dispute for other parts of this trip down there...just not here

I'm probably as big a Moorings fan as anyone but am reaching my limit with them. We have an 07/03 charter scheduled which is obviously not going to happen. I've been avoiding calling them because there are a few weeks to go before the start and I'm sure, as their website says, they are busy dealing with charters that have to be rescheduled.

What ticks me off is they move their "all charters are cancelled" date forward about a week at a time. Perhaps other bases will open sooner but the BVI by all accounts is shut down at least until September. Their current date is now 06/22, so I guess if I wait 2 more Mondays, they'll eventually get around to me.

At this point we fully intend to reschedule, most likely for the same dates in 2021, and not even complain about the fact they'll have use of our money for a full year. I just want to get moving on this because I also need to see what Delta will do with our flights.

What will be interesting to see down the road is which companies fare better from this. Those that refunded customers (some have right?) but didn't pay owners or those (really just Moorings it seems) that paid owners but didn't refund customers. Seems to me keeping customers happy is more important to both parties to ensure repeat business when things do get going again?

What is likely to irritate customers the most is if the companies go belly-up and they lose all their money!

I like Moorings. I really do. My brother in law had a boat in their program for many years selling it just before Irma. I recommend Moorings to everybody

I tried very hard to work with them on this. They were completely non-responsive for emails and calls for a while. When I finally reached Florida I wanted to understand their future and business model given that they were paying out guaranteed cash to owners that hasn't technically been (or will be) earned yet and as most travel companies are thinly capitalized. The nice people in FL were just told to try an retain all bookings and couldn't help further. They wanted to put conditions on my credit in terms of time. I cant just pick up and go to the islands on a moments notice (unfortunately).

I then reached out to my friends in the BVI base. They told me they had been laid off immediately and given a return date that was after this rolling cancel date game that Moorings is playing. The fact that the employees were terminated immediately was the straw that triggered me to pull the plug. So while I left the money on the table for the other local businesses as a credit I really had no desire to do that for KKR especially since they levered up and ultimately killed my favorite store in the whole wide world...ToysR'US. As I mentioned I sent some of that money back to the fired employees so they can buy food.

If it means I am banned from Moorings and apparently Jason's place I can live with that. If they treated their BVI employees better we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Despite your last disrespectful comment, you're welcome at Coconut Breeze Villas anytime. Thought you agreed to disagree. You didn't do anything to me.

Cheers to better days! I'll be the first to buy you a drink when you return.

For clarity my last sentence should have read, "If MOORINGS treated their BVI employees better.....". I meant no disrespect to Jason and certainly apologize for the misunderstanding I created....

As is my custom I will buy anyone here drinks for the kindness, knowledge, and wisdom you have given me

Jason undoubtedly has a better handle on BVI employment practices than I do. My understanding is that, after three months, the lay-offs automatically become terminations, with required severance pay. Especially for businesses with long-term employees, that could mean significant dollars. And heading into slow season, at that.

One way around it might be to recall those laid off in March and lay off other workers until mid-September. I just wonder how many tourism-related busInesses have sufficient cash.

Hi All,

Just wanted to close the loop on this topic I started.

Today Moorings agreed to give us a credit for the full price of our August charter good until September 2022 if we paid in full. Otherwise, we would forfeit our deposit. With the offer in writing, we decided to pay off the balance. We will try to book in Croatia for the same week next year if my parents are willing to travel. If not, we will book in BVI for spring 2022 and go with friends if my parents still can't go.

While I wish Moorings would have given us the credit for our deposit, I understand they probably need the cash to float the rest of this season. Yes, there's always a chance they go under and we just flushed more money down the drain, but I think it's unlikely they don't survive in some form.

I wish everyone the best of luck for a happy, healthy rest of 2020. Maybe we'll see you on the water sometime!

If your final payment is due, say, 60 days before the charter begins, and the charter date changes, shouldn't the payment date change?

Corollary question: is there a distinction between the government closes the border but the charter company is still prepared to do the charter and the charter company closes their base? Compare this to a house rental after Irma. It strikes me there is a difference between the house is useable but you don't want to go and the house blew away.

I can only speak from our personal experience, but because our charter was so far out (August 29,) Moorings was under no requirement to do anything for us. If we changed our charter date, it would have been a $1000 change fee. And then we would have been locked into summer 2021, which my parents didn't want to do. And if we canceled, they'd keep the $3500 deposit.

You might be able to get a free change if you were in their no-sail window of 6 weeks before the charter, but then they'd already have your full balance paid so the question of moving the date with only the deposit paid becomes moot.

My parents say there is no way they will travel to Europe this year, so if we waited too long, we worried we wouldn't have the flexibility to cancel with a full credit because right now Croatia is starting to let sailing charterers arrive in the country and sail. It's pretty hard to get there though with only maybe a half dozen European cities getting flights from the US.