The company has been successful in forging longer term relationships with other shipping companies to provide some guaranteed additional TT capacity. However, the TT period comes at a time when other companies too are also looking to increase their capacity to meet summer demand. As such they are reluctant to release vessels to third parties such as the Steam Packet’.
Mark continued: ‘Physical limits on our port facilities, the suitability of vessels in the international marketplace and differing national safety regulations mean that ships cannot easily be transplanted from one area of operation to another.
‘Where vessels are available, operators typically prefer to secure longer term charters. As such they will not commit to the shorter TT period charter, often until just before the event. Without these firm guarantees we can only offer provisional vessels and timings for the following year’s TT to some of our customers. This is made absolutely clear to customers when we take provisional bookings and deposits. It is explained once again when final payment is due. For precisely these reasons, we have had to alter some of those provisionally booked sailings this year’.
Mark concluded: ‘We are aware that the situation is not ideal and would of course prefer to offer a higher degree of certainty to our customers. We will continue to investigate all viable options that would allow us to improve the situation in the future. In the meantime, our staff are committed to making the Centenary TT a huge success and I would appeal for support from the Island communit