Other news from STCW Training News Update 8:

• Training course of the month
• Mandatory registration of your name in the Dutch Seaman’s book
• How to submit sailing time to Kiwa for renewal of captain’s CoC
• The Basic Safety certificate is not mandatory for every seafarer?

Confusion about the term ‘rating’

Rating. Rating deck. Rating forming part of a navigational watch. These terms are similar but they are not the same, which regularly causes confusion. What is the difference?

First of all: Every seafarer who is not an officer, is a rating. There are ratings with, and ratings without a certificate of competency. Any rating should at least possess a seaman’s book and a medical certificate.

In the STCW convention, the term rating is used for a rating who does not (yet) have a certificate of competency. Generally, a rating is a crew member who is gaining experience on board as part of their education. They may be an apprentice either on deck, in the engine room or on the bridge. A rating is only allowed to carry out tasks under the supervision of a crew member who does have a certificate of competency.

A rating forming part of a navigational watch is a rating in possession of a certificate of competency – issued in accordance with STCW standards – that allows them to independently carry out tasks on deck. In order to gain this certificate of competency, they will have already collected seatime as a rating and have completed basic safety training. A rating forming part of a navigational watch is also called a rating deck. The Dutch term for this function is ‘wachtlopend gezel dek’

The counterpart of the ‘rating forming part of a navigational watch’ is the rating forming part of an engineering watch. This is a rating with a certificate of competence issued under STCW to independently carry out tasks in the engine room.

Different names are used on different documents. We have made an overview of this below:

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