Classification Societies – Vessel Inspection and Certification

There are 15 of these organizations listed in Appendix #2 at the end of this document,

Classification societies, which are generally privately-owned, non-profit and hold no real authority, set ship-quality standards and inspect ships to ensure that they are seaworthy. They produce ship specification rules and supervise the design and construction of ships to see whether these rules are followed; and inspect ships to determine if they are in compliance with the classification societies’regulations, national laws and international conventions. New and existing ships are classified. If a ship passes inspection, the classification society issues a Classification Certificate; if the ship fails the inspection, a certificate is not issued or an existing certificate is withdrawn. Classification societies number more than 50 worldwide and some date back more than 200 years. Five of the largest classification societies (based upon the number of ships classed) are: Lloyd's Register of Shipping, Nippon Kaiji Kyokei, American Bureau of Shipping, Det Norske Veritas of Norway and Bureau Veritas of France.

A ship owner is not required to have his ships classed by a classification society. However, since marine underwriters must be confident that ships are seaworthy, they will only insure classed ships. A ship owner without a Classification Certificate cannot obtain the necessary trading certificates required by ports of call. The Classification Certificate is the industry standard for establishing that a ship is seaworthy.

International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) was established in 1968 to address this problem. The IACS is an association of eleven Classification Societies, including the ten largest. The purpose of the association is twofold: 1) develop uniformity among classification-society rules and 2) represent classification societies in their calibration with other shipping rule-setting organizations (Stopford, 1997). Over 160 sets of IACS Unified Requirements have been developed, e.g., the use of steel grades for various hull members, cargo containment on gas tankers, a minimum longitudinal strength standard, loading and guidance information and fire protection of machinery spaces. The IACS has a governing council which is supported by a general policy group and 23 technical-specialty working parties. IACS members classify over 90 percent of the world’s merchant-ship gross registered tonnage and more than 50 percent of the merchant ships afloat (Ozcayir, 2001).

The IACS has responded to the criticism of classification societies by using the IACS Code of Ethics and Quality System Certification Scheme (QSCS) to address ship standards; IACS members are bound by the QSCS service standards that they render.