SINGAPORE IMMIGRATION IS STRICTLY IMPLEMENTING PASSPORT VALIDITY

Passport is the most important travel documents any travelers needs, of any nationality, including seafarers.

In Singapore, Indonesia and other parts of the world, when crewmembers arrived in port, his/her passport must be valid for at least six (6) months or he/she will be fined with big amount, or in case of repatriation, will be denied.

One (1) Korean Captain was supposed to disembark in Singapore, but when his travel documents were submitted to the Singapore immigration they found out that his passport has less than six (6) months validity.  Considering this, he was denied repatriation and continued to stay onboard, until next port.

Also, this regulation is also being strictly implemented in Indonesia, the penalty for crewmembers who was found to have less than six (6) months validity in passport has been increased from US$0165.00 to US$500.00.  This penaly will not be shoulder by Shipowners/Principals, but will be borned by crewmembers himself.

With this incidents, Shipowners, Principals and Manning Agencies in the Philippines are requiring that all crewmembers must have passport validity of 16-18 months before joining to avoid the above problem in ports, especially in Singapore and Indonesia.