Maldives - Clearance
PRE-ARRIVAL
Use of an agent is mandatory, regardless of your length of stay as all clearance is done through online portals to which only agents have access. See a list of clearance agents here.
Maldives Customs must be notified of your Estimated Time of Arrival at least 12 hours prior to your arrival and kept updated of any changes. This is done via your agent. See notes on “dealing with your agent” below for further details.
All arriving and departing passengers via airports and seaports are required to complete the Traveler Declaration form within 72 hours of departure from their last port: https://imuga.immigration.gov.mv/ethd
If you have crew who are either departing or joining the yacht in the Maldives, the agent needs to know about this at least 72 hours before departure/arrival time, in order to arrange the sign-on /off formalities.
ARRIVAL PROCEDURE
Ports of Entry:
Yachts usually clear in and out at Malé, although now Uligamu in Haa Alifu Atoll and Gan in Addu Atoll are also Ports of Entry. Uligamu is proving to be a popular port at which to clear in and the officials there are reported to be friendly and helpful.
General Process:
An agent must be appointed by all yachts as clearance is only possible through an agent.
If you fail to appoint an agent within 72 hours of arrival, you will be fined MRF 5000.00 (USD 324.25) and have to leave the country.
Stays of less than 7 days:
Vessels below 15m LOA which need to stop in the Maldives for provisioning, fuel and supplies, will be granted a 7-day stay in a designated area where Maldives Customs Services permits. Your agent will complete all clearance paperwork via the online portal. All officials (Customs, Coast Guard, Health and Immigration) will go to the yacht for the clearance.
Staying 7 days or longer:
As per the Tourism’s new regulation No 2023/R-15, a cruising permit is required for yachts to stay more than 7 days, however, yachts less than 20m LOA do not have to pay any fee to the Ministry of Tourism to get a cruising permit. This means that for smaller yachts there is no big price difference even if staying longer than 7 days.
For stays of longer than 7 days, yachts over 20m must apply for and purchase a Cruising Permit.
As of 14 Sep, 2023: Vessels less than 20m LOA can get a FREE Cruising Permit for 90 days.
Agents may charge a fee for the paperwork to arrange a cruising permit.
Applying for a Cruising Permit:
This takes a minimum of 5 working days to secure. It is much easier if the application is made via your agent in advance and it can then be handed over on arrival. If not applied for in advance, you will have to remain at least 5 days in the Port of Entry until a cruising permit has been finalized. See Documents for further details about the Cruising Permit.
Dealing with your Agent
The agent’s fee can be anything upwards of US$200 (less if only staying a few days), although it varies depending on the agent and it is definitely worth shopping around and negotiating the fees to be paid in advance of arrival. There are a number of legitimate agents in the Maldives, see here for a list. Check that any agent used is registered with the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture and it is definitely worth asking around first as to which agents other cruisers recommend.
When an agent has been prearranged, he should be notified 48 hours before arrival. An ETA letter will then be sent by the agent to the Ministry of Defence and National Security, Customs, Port Authority, Immigration, and Quarantine. The details of the ETA letter will include the following particulars and it is likely the agent will request further information and documents:
- Name of vessel
- Name of master and nationality
- Name of owner
- Port of registration and official number
- Gross tonnage
- Callsign
- HF working frequency
- Last port of call
- Estimated date and time of arrival
- Number of crew
Notes:
- If wishing to have guests on board, then a charter license must be purchased as well as payment of the Tourism fee (cruising permit).
- A derating (sanitation) certificate is required for departure. If you don’t have one issued within the last 6 months, it is currently cheaper to organize this outside the Maldives elsewhere in SE Asia. Costs for getting this in the Maldives will likely reduce in 2021. See Documents for more details.
- Crew sign-on: STCW or seamanbook is required for those crew flying into the Maldives to join a yacht as a crew member. Ask the agent in advance and they will explain the procedure.
- Yachts no longer have to pay an additional fee to anchor in Male/Hulhumale.
- Rental of a tracking device is no longer required.
- Be prepared to pay all fees in cash.
DEPARTURE PROCEDURE
A Sanitation certificate (less than 6 months old) is required to clear out. You may well already have one if you previously cleared out of another country (like Indonesia), this will suffice or you can pay to have one issued in the Maldives. This certificate refers to your black/grey water tanks and it typically for commercial vessels, however Maldives, Galapagos and some other countries also ask pleasure yachts for the same.
Last updated: September 2023
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Sail and dive in Maldives: We have been in the Maldives for about 2 months and have dived all the atolls from north to south. We checked in Uligan on 19th January 2023 and checked out Addu on 10th March 2023. We relied on REAL SEAHAWKS agency for all authorization and clearance formalities, permits to land on the islands, boat supplies and dive assistance through the various atolls, as well as receiving parcels from overseas en route. Thanks to Rasheed who is based in Male, Masood who is based in Addu and special thanks to Asad (Asadhulla Mohamed assad@realseahawksmaldives.com) who oversaw all operations and ensured our passage through Maldives was safe and smooth .
Report received from Sailing Vessel TUVALU from Barcelona, Spain [www.tuvalubarcelona.es]
Update Gulf of Aden:
Between the 12th to the 26th of February 2023, we sailed with our Dufour 40 Performance TUVALU from the Maldives (Uligam) to Djibouti. It was a fast trip with most of the day’s nice winds between 10 to 15 knots, so we have been running the engine only for around 48 hours.
The European MSCHOA and the British UKTMO who are protecting the area are still present, contrary to the latest news (saying that they will cease military protection at the end of January 23). We had flyovers twice by a military airplane, talking to them on VHFCh. 16. We also sent to both organizations our daily position through IridiumGo, starting the reports once we left Maldives. We had absolutely no issues with pirates.
We sailed the 600 miles of the ETCM virtual channel in between the transiting cargo ships channel, in a 2 miles-wide area. There are many cargo ships, and at all times you can see several of them – so, you are never alone! But if you are sailing in the area in between, then you are free of them and it’s quite safe.
We left our AIS on, as MSCHOA recommend yachts do, as well as our PredictWind Tracking page: https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV-Tuvalu/
Don Leon and Windkist, two Mexican sailboats have been cruising the Maldives from april 26 to june 18 , 2019, we have a wonderful time in these lovely attols, and would like to comment on the extraordinary service received by our agents, REAL SEAHAWKS, they help us in everything , from charging Diesel , advise us on shopping places, and managing our international spare parts deliveries.
Apr 22, 2019 12:45 PM
We used Asad of Real Seahawks and he was most attentive. He is based in Uligamu and if you go to Male he uses a sister agency there – less good. Agents and everything else in the Maldives is very expensive.
If you are trying to enter the Maldives via Uligamo, we would like to recommend an agent here.
His name is Asadhulla Mohamed, called Asad for short. All communication in advance was straightforward and clear, with all the questions he could help us. He brought us the quarantine, immigration and customs officials on board.
All formalities were conducted quickly and easily under his management – and the official formalities are quite extensive, to say the least. If you do not have an onboard stamp on hand, make sure your right thumb stays blue until you leave.
Asad proved to be a very hospitable agent, with good and valuable information for us. He was always helpful and refreshingly uncomplicated until we left, supporting us in all matters.
We would like to recommend Asad here. I look for a reliable agent in Uligamo: it`s Asad!
If you want to contact him: assad@realseahawksmaldives.com
Five tourists including a honeymooning couple have drowned in a single week in the Maldives, officials said, prompting a nationwide safety warning to holiday resorts in the pristine islands.
Tourism officials said all resort operators in the paradise archipelago were urged Monday to keep a close eye on their clients after the spate of deaths.
Strong currents caused by a north-east monsoon were blamed for the slew of drownings in the idyllic atoll nation, where such accidents are usually few and far between.
Around 1.4 million tourists visit the Maldives every year but the latest government data shows just 31 people drowned in 2017.
On January 13, two Filipino newlyweds were swept to their deaths by a powerful undertow.
The man got into trouble and his wife went to his aid, but both perished. Their bodies were recovered and repatriated to the Philippines, officials said.
An 84-year-old Czech tourist and a 66-year-old South Korean woman died within two days of each other at a resort near the capital Male while snorkelling.
A Russian woman on a dive trip was the latest casualty on Sunday.
A Pakistani holidaymaker came close to death but was plucked to safety and taken to the hospital.
The tourism ministry was in the process of identifying safe zones for ocean swimming and diving after the spike in drownings, officials said.
We used Ship Care as an agent in Male for entry and exit. one of the owner Afrah is a good man and even elected as some official but still spent the time to meet us. The operation is by his colleague. The agency fee and the charges had been raised a bit comparing to the charges posted by the previous sailor.
We are a 58ft Tanya monohull and with the final charge of USD1000 including the agency fee, mooring, cruising permits (for 1 month while we only stayed 1 week). The service from Ship Care is acceptable. However, in getting the water, it had been charged a bit high comparing high with add on. We paid for the first time of 1 ton through the agent at USD110 while we directly ordered the water for the 2nd time at USD50.
We sailed the Maldives for one month now, found the places lovely in this period with mostly sun and light Wind, perfect for our guests Christmas holiday, most of the time in felidhee atolls where you can easily find desert Islands with good shallow sandy anchorages.
we suggest mainly 2 island: bodumohoraa(southern felidhe atoll) with a nice lagoon on its west side where anchor in 6/8mt depth and Vashugiri(north-west of felhide atoll)all the area here is mainly sand WNW of the island a good anchorage just 40nm from Malè.
All the paperwork been manage by shipcaremaldives agents, Afrah and Hanson have been very nice helping us sorting out everything we needed, included provisioning and refuelling from our arrival until our departure.
They managed everything in a great familiar as a professional way to makes you forget about all burocratics and organizing nightmares you can find travelling around the world.
You can contact them at info@shipcaremaldives.com
We are now sailing back to Seychelles where you can really experience what a bureaucracy nightmare is.
In March 2017 we will have been in Maldives 2 years. We have paid many “school fees” by dealing with the wrong people, simply because its impossible to tell real experts from the wannabe experts. With hindsight, the key to cruising Maldives is to select the right agent in the first place. That in itself is no easy task, because whilst they are trying to get your business, all agents promise the world.
Once you have the right agent then life gets easier, because he will put you onto the right suppliers and give you the shortcuts. Unfortunately, once we signed up with our selected agent the reality was a nightmare. The main issue was that one cannot terminate or change agents without a letter of no objection FROM THE AGENT HIMSELF.
This left us in a catch 22 situation, and we paid dearly for that letter, allowing us to change agents. After 2 false starts with the wrong agents, we found SHIP CARE MALDIVES, a fairly new agency run by Afrah and Hanoon. (info@shipcaremaldives.com) After 3 months I was confident enough in their service levels to post a reference on noonsite. It has now been 6 months and I have been impressed that they have maintained, if not improved their service levels.
Afrah and Hanoon are fluent in English and have a very good idea of what servicing a client really means. No task is too much trouble and they have gone the extra mile for me numerous times. Please feel free to mail me if you need any info.
We have been in Maldives for over a year and have had some bad experiences with unscrupulous agents. Thankfully we found a new agency SHIP CARE MALDIVES, owned and run by Afrah who has been exceptional. He is honest and his prices are reasonable, and there are no surprises when the invoice arrives. I’d recommend his services without hesitation.
When we entered the Maldives we experienced a lot of Technical problems. All which have been resolved thanks to a contact who was given to us by some friends. This guy is not an agent he is someone who helps the sailing community with their problems.
We really can recommend this person. If you need a spare part or an engineer, electrician whatsoever he will organise it for you. (Most of the spare parts are available in Male) He sends you a copy of the selling price and he put a small service charge on top of it. We paid him a very moderate and acceptable fee for all his efforts and stayed in communication during our whole trip. Just before leaving to chagos we experienced another technical problem which required our immediate attention.
The spare part was delivered to us just in a day. Thanks, Badeeu for all what you have done for us. For anyone who is interested in contacting him here is his phone number. 7527312
Posted on behalf of SV Totem, 31 March 2015:
Official fees for permits and clearance make the Maldives among the most expensive countries we’ve visited, and certainly the most costly in terms of unavoidable-fees-per-day. One month is nearly $900. But most of these fees are fixed whether you stay one month or three months, so by staying longer we bring down our daily cost- we’ll average around $17/day over two months.
Agent fees are just a small fraction, and similar to Sri Lanka and French Polynesia – the other countries we’ve been required to have an agent. The biggest charge in the Maldives is from the tourism ministry. It feels high, and in planning our route this year, there were times we questioned coming. But one week in, we’re glad we did, and excited about the weeks ahead here.
Our experience was that Assad was great in Uligan, but Rasheed was the worst of the worst. He represents Advandfort security contractor, so as long as you use them, he’ll help you, but we had a different contractor and he made our life’s very difficult, lied to us about the storage costs until the day before we were meant to embark the weapons, where he upped our quote $11,000. In the end, we luckily found another weapons owner and agent that was much more reliable and trustworthy.
I’d recommend Abdul Hannan from Antrac (ahannan@antracmaldives.com) who has agents in Uligan as well. He’s well connected and been in the business many more years than Rasheed.
Posted on behalf of SY Tamarisk:
We had a very favourable experience with Assad and Rasheed at Real Seahawks Maldives as agents there, and they can assist in finding security for the GOA crossing.