How to · 9 minute read
To quote a company yacht booking in Dubai accurately, an operator needs seven things: the date, the window, the headcount, the purpose, the catering position, whether you are filming, and the invoicing entity. Sending all seven in the first message usually turns a three-day email thread into one reply.
By Roshan Shriwastav · Published
Every one of these changes either the boat, the price or whether the charter is possible at all. Missing any of them means an operator quotes a range, and a range is not something you can take to finance.
The number on a vessel licence is a legal limit, and it counts everybody physically aboard: your guests, the caterer's two staff, the photographer, the DJ. A team of twenty with a photographer and two catering staff is twenty-three, and that is a different boat from the one that carries twenty-two.
Adding a person on the day is not a favour a captain can do. They will be turned away at the pontoon, which is a poor thing to happen to a client.
Photography and video for your own channels are straightforward and permitted with notice. Drone work is not straightforward: it needs a permit, and the realistic lead time is a week rather than a day. Say at the enquiry stage if a drone is in the plan, not when the operator arrives.
For a launch or a brand shoot, send the shot list too. It changes the route, the time of day and sometimes the boat. A shot of the Burj Al Arab behind a product needs the boat in a specific place at a specific hour.
Send the registered entity name, the address and the TRN with the booking rather than after the event. A tax invoice reissued in a different name after the charter is an accounting problem for both sides, and some finance teams will not accept it at all.
If your company holds a UAE trade licence, ask about payment terms at the same time. Terms are commonly available to companies and never to individuals, and it is easier to set up at booking than to renegotiate once a deposit has been taken.
Everything above fits in six lines. Something in this shape gets a boat, a price and an availability answer in one reply:
"Thursday 12 March, 16:00 to 20:00, four hours. Twenty-two guests including a photographer and two catering staff. Client hosting, so quiet enough to talk. Canapés and soft drinks through you. Stills for our own channels, no drone. Invoice to [entity], TRN [number], thirty-day terms if possible."
The purpose line in that message does more work than people expect, because the three common corporate charters want almost opposite things from a boat.
Client hosting needs to be quiet enough to hold a conversation, which rules out the flybridge under way and points at a boat with a proper air-conditioned saloon: the 55ft or the 85ft. Seating that lets eight people face each other matters more than deck space. Four hours at a gentle pace with one anchor stop works better than a fast circuit.
A team day wants the opposite: deck, swim platform, music, and enough space that thirty people are not queuing. The 62ft or 85ft, three or four hours, and an anchor stop long enough for everyone to get in the water. A launch or a shoot is different again. It is scheduled around light and location rather than comfort, and the boat is a platform rather than a venue.
Hourly rates are the same for companies as for anyone else. The boat does not cost more because the invoice has a TRN on it. What makes a corporate charter more expensive than a private one is usually duration, catering and the extras rather than the base rate.
A realistic four-hour client-hosting charter for twenty-two guests on the 62ft is AED 5,600 for the boat, plus catering at AED 250 to AED 450 a head, plus a photographer from AED 800. Call it AED 12,000 to AED 17,000 all in. A team day on the same boat with your own food is AED 5,600 and very little else.
The number worth giving finance is the all-in one, and the way to get it is to state the catering position in the enquiry. An operator quoting only the boat is quoting a third of what you will actually spend.
The two windows that work in Dubai are 12:00 to 16:00 and 16:00 to 20:00, and the second is better for almost every purpose. It picks up the sunset, it does not require people to take a full day, and it ends at an hour where guests can go on somewhere or go home without the evening being over too early.
Avoid Friday for anything with a mixed team. It is the weekend here and attendance suffers. Thursday evening is the strongest slot of the week and books furthest ahead. Midweek afternoons are the easiest to secure and the cheapest to move if a date slips, which for a corporate booking with several diaries involved is worth more than it sounds.
Between October and April, give a month's notice for a Thursday evening. In summer, a week is usually enough and the morning slots are wide open.
Corporate charters fail in a small number of predictable ways, and every one of them is settled at the enquiry stage rather than on the day.
The date, the time window and duration, the total headcount including staff and vendors, the purpose of the charter, the catering position, whether anything is being filmed, and the entity to invoice with its TRN. Those seven get you a firm quote in one reply.
Yes. The licensed number counts everybody aboard, so a team of twenty with a photographer and two catering staff is twenty-three. Give the full number at the enquiry stage so you are put on the right boat.
Yes, and you should ask for it at booking rather than afterwards. Send the registered entity name, address and TRN with the enquiry, reissuing an invoice in a different name after the event causes problems for both sides.
About a week, because it needs a permit. Photography and video without a drone need only notice. Say at the enquiry stage if a drone is planned rather than on the day.
Commonly, for companies holding a UAE trade licence, and never for individuals. Ask at booking. It is easier to arrange before a deposit is taken than after.
The boat is AED 750 to AED 3,200 an hour, the same rate as any private charter. A realistic four-hour client-hosting event for twenty-two guests with catering and a photographer comes to about AED 12,000 to AED 17,000 all in.
16:00 to 20:00. It catches the sunset, does not cost people a working day, and ends at an hour that suits both going on somewhere and going home. Thursday evening is the strongest slot of the week and books furthest ahead.
Not on a yacht: the largest is licensed for thirty-five and that is a legal limit. Above that the option is private hire of a whole dhow, from about AED 9,000 for two hours and up to a hundred guests.
Leave the date and roughly how many of you there are and we will come back with the boats that are free and what each costs. No deposit at this stage.
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