Fixed and forgiven are not the same thing in shipping

13 findings were rectified on board before the inspector disembarked. 2 were logged on the report with a proposed rectification plan beside them, approved by the inspector.

I posted that story on LinkedIn the Sunday before. It was a charterer’s inspection, and it was the understanding of the inspector that made that agreement possible.

Under most inspection regimes it would not be. Take Port State Control as one example. Had that visit been a PSC inspection, all 15 findings would be on the ship’s record today. The 13 that were rectified would each be recorded as rectified, and rectified items stay on the record. They go into the database and they follow the ship into every commercial conversation about it.
Fixed and forgiven are not the same thing in shipping.

Aviation faced this 50 years ago. The Aviation Safety Reporting System was set up in 1976 and is run by NASA, deliberately, because NASA has no power to punish anyone. A pilot who reports their own honest mistake, or a near miss nobody else saw, faces no penalty. The regulator treats the report itself as evidence of a constructive attitude. Aviation is now the safest way there is to move a human being.

So here is the change I propose, and it applies to every inspection, whoever the inspector works for. Port State, class, flag, charterer, owner, it makes no difference. A finding rectified before the inspector leaves is recorded as closed, and closed findings are kept for learning, with no ship’s name attached to them. A finding that cannot be closed goes on the report, with a proposed rectification plan beside it.

The record would show the ship as the inspector left it, not as they found it. The learning survives. The ammunition does not.

Nothing would be hidden. Everything would be either fixed or on paper.

Do we need more inspections, or a change in the way every inspection is done?

The second chance is not a failure. It is an opportunity to improve.