Marine cover
The survey decides whether you can shop at all
Above an age or a value the carrier sets, a marine policy is not quoted without a current condition and valuation survey. It is the one renewal input that can end the conversation before it starts — and the one you can deal with months in advance.
Written by the AiM Insurance negotiation deskLast updated
What it is for
A survey produces two things an underwriter reads separately: a condition report with recommendations and a valuation. The first decides whether the risk is written and on what terms. The second is what an agreed-value figure is argued from. A recommendation that was raised and never closed out sits on the file as a known defect — and it follows you to every other carrier you approach, not just this one.
The kinds of survey, and which one you need
Owners are regularly quoted for the wrong one, or pay twice for overlapping work. The names are not interchangeable and the scopes genuinely differ.
- Condition and valuation survey
- The survey written for insurance. It assesses structural condition and safety systems and states a value the underwriter can work from. It normally needs the vessel out of the water, because the most consequential findings are below the waterline.
- Pre-purchase survey
- The broadest kind, commissioned by a buyer before closing, usually with a haul-out and often a sea trial. Carriers frequently accept a recent one for binding, which can save an owner commissioning a second inspection of the same boat within months of the first.
- Insurance or renewal survey
- A narrower inspection aimed at what one underwriter has asked to see. Useful when a carrier names its requirements; less useful as a document to shop with, because the next market may ask for more.
- Engine survey
- A separate discipline and usually a separate commission. A hull surveyor records what can be observed and operated; internal engine condition, oil analysis and compression testing belong to a mechanic.
- Damage survey
- Commissioned after an incident to establish cause, extent and cost to repair. It answers a claim question rather than an underwriting one, and it is not a substitute for a condition and valuation survey.
When a carrier asks for one
Two categories of trigger, and they behave differently. The first is a threshold the vessel crosses on its own; the second is an event.
- The hull reaches the age the carrier has set as its survey threshold. Nothing about the boat changed — the calendar did.
- The insured value sits above the figure that carrier will write unsurveyed. Raising an agreed value can trip this on its own.
- A new policy, a new owner, or a move to a new carrier. A market that has never seen the vessel starts from evidence, not history.
- A major refit, a repower or structural repair. The boat now on risk is not the boat the last survey described.
- A significant claim. Carriers frequently want a current condition report before continuing cover on a repaired vessel.
- A move to a different cruising area. A hull that satisfied an underwriter for sheltered inland use is being asked to do something else.
- The report on file simply aged out. Carriers state a maximum acceptable age, and those windows differ between them.
Check it yourselfAge thresholds, value thresholds and the maximum acceptable age of a report are set by each carrier and are not standard across the market. There is no useful average to quote here — ask your own carrier, and each market you approach, for theirs in writing before you spend anything.
What the surveyor actually looks at
A condition and valuation survey is not a general opinion about whether the boat is nice. It works through the systems whose failure produces the losses a marine underwriter is exposed to, which is why the report reads the way it does.
| Area | What the surveyor is examining | Why it is on an underwriter's list |
|---|---|---|
| Hull and structure | The hull out of the water, moisture readings, blistering and delamination, keel and rudder attachment, stringers, bulkheads and the hull-to-deck joint | Structural failure is the loss that sinks a vessel rather than damaging it, and it takes the salvage and wreck exposure with it |
| Through-hulls and seacocks | Fittings, hoses, clamping, backing blocks, bonding, and whether the valves actually operate | A failed fitting floods a boat at its berth with nobody aboard and nothing to interrupt it |
| Electrical systems | AC and DC wiring, panels and overcurrent protection, the shore power connection, battery installation and securing, bonding and corrosion protection | Fire and stray-current corrosion both begin here, and both are slow, invisible and expensive |
| Fuel, exhaust and machinery installation | Fuel lines, tanks and venting, exhaust runs, engine mounts and beds, ventilation — with engines observed in operation rather than opened | Fuel and exhaust faults are a fire and carbon monoxide exposure, and an installation fault is an underwriting question rather than a mechanical one |
| Steering, ground tackle and rig | Steering gear and its linkages, anchor and rode, and on a sailing vessel the standing and running rigging, chainplates and mast step | Losing steering or a rig is a towing and salvage event, not a repair bill |
| Safety equipment | Life jackets, fire extinguishers and fixed systems, visual distress signals, sound signalling, navigation lights, bilge pumps and high-water alarms | The cheapest recommendations to close and the most conspicuous if you do not — an open safety item still reads as an open item |
| Valuation | Condition, equipment, documented history and comparable evidence, stated as a value and sometimes a replacement cost | It is the figure an agreed-value policy is written against, which makes the settlement basis a survey question as well as a pricing one |
Scopes differ between surveyors and with what you commission, so this describes the shape of a condition and valuation survey rather than any one report. Ask for the scope letter before the haul-out: what a surveyor has excluded matters to you as much as what they inspected.
How a finding turns into a condition of your policy
The recommendations are the part an underwriter reads closely, and they are where a survey stops being a document and becomes an obligation. Most reports group findings by urgency, but the labels vary from surveyor to surveyor — read how the categories are defined in your report rather than assuming a house style.
The report is issued with its recommendations grouped
What matters is not the heading but which items the surveyor marked as required before the vessel is used again. Those are the ones that reach the underwriter first.The underwriter reads the recommendations, not the prose
A condition and valuation survey is a long document and the decision is usually made from a short list inside it. Worth knowing before you skim past the summary page.Some recommendations become terms
A carrier can record an item as a note, require it to be completed inside a stated period as a condition, or write it as a warranty. Ask which of the three applies to each item — those words carry very different consequences at claim time.You complete the work and evidence it
Invoices, a yard work order, photographs, and where the item is structural or safety-critical a letter from the surveyor confirming re-inspection. A verbal assurance from a yard manager is not evidence.You send the evidence and ask for written confirmation
Specifically, that the condition has been removed from the policy. An item you believe is closed and the carrier still shows as open is the worst of both positions.You keep the whole file
Survey, recommendations, invoices, confirmation. The next carrier will ask, and the owner who can produce the file in an afternoon is a different risk from the one who cannot find it.
Check it yourselfWhether an outstanding recommendation is treated as a note, a condition or a warranty is a matter of the individual policy wording and the carrier’s own underwriting practice, not a market rule. Ask which word applies to each item, and ask for it in writing.
What to do with the report when it lands
In rough order of return, starting the day it arrives rather than the week the renewal notice does.
- Read all of it, including the limitations paragraphThe summary is written to be read quickly. The limitations are where you learn what was not inspected, and why.
- Close the safety items firstExtinguishers, signals, lights, pumps and alarms are usually the fastest and cheapest recommendations to clear, and they are disproportionately visible on a file.
- Check the valuation against your settlement basisThe figure in the survey is what an agreed value is argued from. If the two do not match, that is a conversation to have now rather than after a loss.
- Correct factual errors in writing, to the surveyorModel, year, equipment, engine hours, documented repairs. A correction belongs in an amended report, not in an email to your broker.
- Ask your broker which recommendations the carrier adoptedNot all of them will be, and the ones that were are the only ones carrying a deadline.
- Diarise the completion datesA condition with a stated period is a date you can miss. Put it where you keep the renewal date.
A note on who does the survey
Marine surveying is not a licensed profession in the way many trades are; the recognised credentials come from voluntary accrediting bodies, and carriers commonly name which ones they accept and require the surveyor to be independent of the sale and of the yard doing the work. Ask your carrier what it accepts before you book rather than afterwards — a report from a surveyor the underwriter will not take is an expensive way to learn the requirement.
How this shows up in a price
Three distinct ways, and only one of them is about the premium directly. A current survey opens markets that will not quote without one, which is the difference between a competitive process and a single renewal offer to accept or refuse. It supports the settlement basis, because an agreed value has to be argued from evidence — the detail is in agreed value versus actual cash value. And it removes unknowns: an underwriter with no current information about an older hull prices the uncertainty, and uncertainty is never priced in your favour.
It is also one of the few marine inputs you control outright. Where you are allowed to take the boat and when it sits idle are the other two — see navigational limits and named-storm clauses and lay-up periods and seasonal credits. The overview of what moves a marine renewal is why your boat or yacht insurance went up, and if the vessel is large enough that a surveyor’s findings become a conversation rather than a checklist, the yacht insurance page describes what we do with that.
Common questions
When does boat insurance require a marine survey?
Most commonly when the vessel passes an age or an insured-value threshold the carrier sets, and at moments of change: a new policy, a new owner, a move to a new carrier, a major refit or repower, a move to a different cruising area, or the aftermath of a significant claim. Those thresholds are not standard across the market, so the only reliable answer is your own carrier's. Ask for it in writing before you start shopping, because it decides whether you are able to shop at all.
How old can a marine survey be for insurance purposes?
Each carrier states a maximum age for the report it will accept, and the windows differ enough that a survey comfortably inside one carrier's limit can be outside another's. That is why survey age is a shopping question rather than a renewal question: a stale survey does not usually produce a higher quote, it produces no quote, and every application you sent is wasted. Ask each market for its survey age requirement before you send anything else.
What is the difference between a pre-purchase survey and an insurance survey?
Scope. A pre-purchase survey is the broadest kind, commissioned by a buyer before closing, and it normally includes hauling the vessel out and often a sea trial. A condition and valuation survey for insurance targets what an underwriter needs to see: structural condition, safety systems and a supportable value. A recent pre-purchase survey is frequently accepted for insurance, which is worth establishing before you pay for a second inspection of the same boat.
Does a marine survey include the engines?
Usually not in the way owners expect. A hull surveyor records what can be observed and operated without opening machinery, and refers internal engine condition to a mechanic — an engine survey is a separate discipline, commissioned separately. Read the scope letter before the survey happens rather than the limitations paragraph afterwards, because what the surveyor excluded matters to you as much as what they inspected.
What happens if I do not complete the survey recommendations?
It depends on what the carrier did with them, and the three possibilities are very different. A recommendation can be recorded as a note, attached as a condition the policy requires you to complete inside a stated period, or written as a warranty. Ask which of the three applies to each item, in writing, because an open item in the second or third category is a known defect on your file — and it follows you to every other market you approach.
Who pays for a marine survey?
The owner or the buyer commissions it and pays for it, and the surveyor's duty runs to whoever commissioned the report. That is an advantage as well as a cost: a survey you paid for is yours, and you can send it to as many markets as you like. It is also why carriers care about independence — a surveyor who is also the yard quoting for the repairs, or the broker selling the boat, is not the same thing as an independent inspection.
Can a marine survey lower my boat insurance premium?
Not as a discount, but it changes what can be priced. A current survey opens markets that will not quote without one, it supports the figure an agreed-value policy is written against, and it removes the unknowns an underwriter would otherwise price defensively. Closing out open recommendations does the same job in reverse, by taking a known defect off the file. None of that is a button marked discount, and a quote that offers you one for the survey itself is describing something else.
Renewal asking for a survey you have not booked?
Send the declarations page and the renewal notice. We establish what each market actually requires before you spend anything on an inspection, price the same terms across 50+ providers, and take the result back to your current carrier first. An answer either way within 24 hours.
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