Floating chance for boat licences with easy access
A popular boat rental company has launched a licensing program that gives wannabe skippers the chance to call themselves captain in a day – all within a 1km radius of Capri on Via Roma.
GoBoat Australia has been hiring out electric picnic boats in Surfers Paradise since May of last year.
Owner and managing director Nick Tyrrell said its new program was about taking the complexity out of boat licensing.
“We’ve modernised how boat licences are delivered,” he said.
“Instead of using platforms that have been around for 10-20 years, we’ve started (our program) from scratch making it as modern and accessible as possible.”
Mr Tyrrell said Queensland had the strictest boat licensing regime in the country, which was why the company wanted to develop the program for Queenslanders first.
“If we can be successful with it and make it accessible and engaging and compliant in Queensland of all places – rolling it out to the rest of the country becomes a fair bit more straightforward,” he said.
The course took 18 months to develop alongside Maritime Safety Queensland, he said.
“It all started because we have tens of thousands of people on our GoBoats and most don’t have their boat licence,” Mr Tyrrell said.
“We wanted to offer the same kind of accessibility to boat licences as we do with boating and take the complexity out of it,” he said.
“All the theory is self-paced online through our platform, then people book in to do a short course and practical assessment (in the same day) on the water with our instructor.”