Adrian Stott wrote: > Steve Wood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> John Slee wrote: >>> --- In [email protected], Adrian Stott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >>>> Boats on rivers moored on-line to private property don't have them >>>> either. >> Its not just a river thing. People with historic mooring rights e.g. old >> wharves etc. don't need them either. >> >>> So can someone on a BW river make (say) £20 for each ("former") >>> continuous cruiser who declares his/her mooring as their home base, >>> thus depriving BW of their (potential) £150? >> I do know of an offline mooring who don't pay a connection fee who had a >> list from BW of all the boats declaring they were moored there which >> included a number of boats they'd never heard of! > > This is the scam known as "virtual mooring". It is almost impossible > for (e.g.) BW to counter, especially if the mooring concerned is on a > non-BW navigation. This is yet another reason why the requirement for > a boat to have a long-term mooring should not be part of the > licence-issuance decision (the main one is that it is useless for > preventing towpath squatting).
It also feels like another argument for the "add a basic mooring charge to all licenses, reduce mooring fees that currently include an element paid to BW by this much). But, as I've said before, I don't know how you make sure the second part happens.
