Refit and yard works: how a project is run

A refit is any yard period substantial enough to need managing as a project rather than booking as a service, from a routine docking with a paint job and a machinery overhaul through to a rebuild that changes the vessel's layout and systems. Small and large versions share a sequence: a specification, a tender, a contract, a yard period, trials, delivery and a warranty term. This page describes how that sequence is usually run and how the work is usually priced. It recommends no yard and no manager.

What a refit project involvesLink to this section#

The specification is the document everything else hangs from. It states what is to be done, to what standard, with which materials, and what counts as complete. A vague specification is the most reliable source of dispute in yard works, because every unclear line becomes a variation order priced after the yard already has the vessel. Tendering a clear specification to more than one yard produces quotations that can be compared.

The owner's team and the yardLink to this section#

The yard is a contractor: it carries out the work, prices variations and delivers against the contract. The owner's team writes the specification, tests the quotations against it, approves or refuses variations and signs off the result. That team is commonly some mix of the captain and chief engineer, a management company, an independent project manager, a naval architect and a surveyor. The two roles are kept distinct so that the party pricing the work is not the only party judging it.

Project management modelsLink to this section#

Four arrangements cover most projects. Captain-led, where the vessel's own senior crew run the yard period, works well for familiar scopes and stretches thin on a long or technically unusual one. Management-led means the yacht's management company supervises, as part of or as an extension of its existing scope. An independent project manager is engaged for this project only and reports to the owner. In a turnkey arrangement the yard itself takes the management role, which simplifies the owner's life and reduces the independence of the oversight, a trade-off to weigh before signing rather than discover later.

How refit fees are usually structuredLink to this section#

There are two separate money questions and they are often confused. The first is what the yard charges. Yard quotations are typically written either as a fixed price against a defined specification, as a schedule of rates applied to measured work, or as cost plus an agreed margin. Fixed price is only as fixed as the specification is complete, so the variation procedure deserves as much attention as the headline figure: who may authorize a change, how it is priced, and how it is recorded.

The second question is what project management costs, priced separately from the yard. The common models are a fixed fee for a defined scope, a retainer for the duration of the project, a percentage of the project value, or time spent at an agreed rate. Each carries a different incentive, and a percentage-of-value fee in particular rises as the work grows, which is not disqualifying but is worth addressing in the engagement letter. Surveyors, class, designers and specialist subcontractors are usually engaged and billed on their own terms. This page names the structures and states no amounts; what any of them costs belongs in a quotation for a specific vessel and scope.

Survey oversightLink to this section#

Independent oversight during the yard period turns a specification into evidence. A surveyor or the owner's engineer attends at agreed hold points, the moments when work is about to be covered up: tanks before they are closed, structure before it is faired, coating stages before the next layer, machinery before reassembly. Where the vessel is classed, the classification society's own surveyor attends for class items on its own schedule, which does not replace the owner's oversight. Keep a photographic record through the project.

Handover and warrantyLink to this section#

Delivery is normally a list rather than a moment: a defects or punch list agreed between the owner's team and the yard, with items closed out before or after the vessel leaves. Contracts usually carry a warranty term for the yard's own work, sometimes with a retention held back until it expires, and separate manufacturer warranties on equipment. The practical questions are how warranty work is scheduled once the yacht is back in service, who pays to bring vessel and technician together, and what evidence the yard needs to accept a claim.

Does an owner need a project manager for a small yard period?Link to this section#

Not always. Familiar, well-specified work with an experienced engineer aboard is often run by the vessel's own crew. Independent management earns its fee as the scope grows less familiar, the yard is new to the vessel, or the work touches class and certification.

What belongs in a yard contract?Link to this section#

The specification and the variation procedure. Almost every refit dispute traces back to a scope that was unclear at signature or to a change that was made without being priced and recorded first. Everything else in the contract is easier to argue about than either of those.

Who holds the owner's side of a refit?Link to this section#

Either the captain and chief engineer, or an independent project manager appointed for the period, or a management company already running the vessel. The choice turns on the scope and on how much of the owner's own time the work would otherwise take.

Where can an owner put these questions to a firm?Link to this section#

This page is informational rather than advice. The right structure depends on the vessel, the scope and the yard. Tell us what you are looking for and choose which firms to approach, or read yacht management explained.