A EUR 4,200 invoice lands from a shipyard: new sunpad cushions for the flybridge. Is that interior? Is it deck? Is it maintenance, or is it an improvement to the asset? Where you put it decides which department gets blamed at the next budget review, and whether the owner accountants treat it as an expense or as capital.
What the books are for
The yacht keeps a set of accounts because somebody who is not onboard needs to know what was spent, on what, and whether it was authorised. The chart of accounts is the agreed list of buckets that spending falls into. It is set by the management company or the owner accountants, not invented by the purser, and it must be applied identically month after month or the comparisons are worthless.
A typical structure
| Range | Category | Example accounts |
|---|---|---|
| 4000 | Income | Charter revenue, APA received, owner funding |
| 5000 | Crew | Wages, payroll costs, crew travel, recruitment, training, uniform, medical |
| 6000 | Vessel operating | Fuel, lubricants, berthing, maintenance, spares, class and flag fees, insurance |
| 7000 | Guest and charter | Provisions, beverage, guest transport, flowers, charter expenses |
| 8000 | Shore and administration | Management fees, bank charges, communications, software, professional fees |
| 9000 | Capital | Additions to the vessel, major refit works, new equipment |
Departments (deck, engineering, interior, galley, bridge) cut across the account codes as a second dimension. A good coding line therefore has both: 6120 Maintenance / Deck.
Coding decisions
- Cost centre first, account second. Ask which department consumed the item, then what type of cost it is.
- Consistency beats correctness. If last year sunpad cushions were coded to interior soft furnishings, code them there again and raise the definition with the office rather than silently changing it.
- Keep a written coding guide onboard, listing awkward recurring items and where they go. It is the single most useful document a purser can leave behind.
Capital versus operating
An operating expense keeps the yacht in the condition it was in: a repair, a service, consumables. A capital expense adds an asset or materially extends life or value: a new tender, a rebuilt interior, a stabiliser upgrade. Owner accountants care because capital is depreciated rather than expensed, and it may affect the vessel valuation and any charter structure. The purser flags; the accountants decide.
The audit trail
Every transaction should be provable end to end: approval → order → delivery evidence → invoice → payment → ledger entry → statement. Miss any link and the entry is an assertion rather than a fact.
Onboard Notes
- Never code a cost to the wrong department to protect a colleague from a variance conversation. It is a small lie that grows into a false report.
- Retain source documents in a form that survives you: scanned, named consistently, backed up.
- Record retention periods vary by flag, jurisdiction and the owner structure. Ask the management company how long records must be kept rather than assuming.