The UK Ports & Marine Facilities Safety Code (PMSC) states that ports and marine facilities must appoint a Designated Person (DP) to provide independent assurance of their marine safety management system and impartial advice on matters of safety.
The PMSC goes on to stipulate that the DP “must have a thorough knowledge and understanding” of the Code’s requirements, the related guideance document 'A guide to good practice on port and marine facilities' (GtGP) and associated port and marine legislation. The Guide itself recommends that harbour masters and their reports are not appointed as the DP.
ABPmer’s Maritime team specialises in understanding the PMSC inside out, regularly running training courses on the elements of the Code, facilitating risk management workshops and undertaking safety management system compliance audits.
Our experienced DPs are appointed to ports and harbours of varying scale and size around the UK, sharing their knowledge and experience gained from pilotage, mooring operations, harbour master and port consultancy.
Having an appointed ABPmer DP means:
Contact your DP whenever needed
Your DP can present findings from audits and ongoing trend analysis to your harbour board, ensuring conformity with your operations
Specialist reviews conducted as and when required
A desk-based exercise carried out alongside the latest version of the PMSC and GtGP to benchmark the industry standard
Audits in alignment with the GtGP, which requires internal audits to be carried out annually, and recommends external audits are conducted every three years