[PUP] taxes and registration

[Dave Cooper]

John wrote in part: That said, I haven't been able to find any on-line doc
that indicates whether US Immigration treats US flagged vessels any
different than Foreign flagged vessels, especially as regards foreign
nationals on board, either guests or crew.
Does anyone have any experience with this?>

No and yes ;-)
Any foreign national needs to have the proper Visa in their passport before
arriving by sea in a private vessel. This visa is usually different than a
normal tourist Visa.
For example many foreign nationals are granted a visa upon arrival by common
carrier into the US. Others need to get a Visa before departing their home
country.

Most European and UK citizens fall into this category..or at least have
unless the new rules have changed things in the last few months or weeks.
They are issued a tourist Visa when they arrive. Now the same individuals if
they are aboard your vessel and you arrive in the US they are NOT granted a
Visa and in fact you are subject to fines/confiscation, etc if you try to do
this.
Any non US Citizen aboard needs either a current in force tourist Visa OR a
current "D" Visa to be allowed entry. "guest = tourist vs. paid crew = D".
For some nationals it is very difficult to even get a "D" Visa vs. a tourist
one. Why I don't have a clue. Generally speaking it is costing just shy of a
thousand $$ to get US Visa's in most countries. The waiting time is huge  6
months to a year and you have a small chance of success.

A UK friend who has had a "D" Visa just spent $300 in appointment/visa fees
and it took him 3 months to get it renewed in the UK this spring/summer at
the US Embassy in person. It used to be renewed for 10 years now it's a much
shorter time before he has to go back. I think 2 years but not sure.

Confused yet? These are just the rules to enter the US with non-citizens.
Think of doing this and understanding the rules that each country has if you
have a mixed crew.

On our recent cruise to 14 countries it would have been a nightmare if we
had a mixed passport crew! Again the rules are changing so fast that keeping
up is a full time job.

It's a damn shame, IMHO, that we can't choose our cruising friends without
checking their/our passports/Visas and having to work our itinerary around
the combination of rules today.....tomorrow they'll be different again.

Hope this helps a bit.

As always YMMV.....

Dave & Nancy
Swan Song
Roughwater 58