MCA short course approvals

Introduction

The MCA approves and monitors training providers (such as nautical colleges and small private enterprises) to run STCW short courses. Short courses are an essential element of safety training required for the issueissuance of a UK seafarer Certificate of Competency (CoC) or for a seafarer to take up employment onboard a ship. On successful completion of the course, a seafarer is issued with a certificate that demonstrates they have met the required standard.

How to find MCA approved courses

Some training providers may offer a course under the authority of other countries’ administrations as well as the MCA so it’s important to check the course you’re about to book is the MCA approved version (this can often be found on the course web page).

Training provider is not listed

1). Does the training provider state the course is MCA approved?

If not, it is unlikely to be approved by the MCA. You should instead find out which administration approved this and check whether we can accept/recognise the course.

2). Could the company you found be acting as an intermediary?

The company advertising MCA approved courses may not be the provider delivering the training but are instead acting as a commercial partner. In most cases, the course web page will tell you who the actual training provider is.

3). If the advice above does not resolve your query, please email exams@mcga.gov.uk

How to become a MCA approved training provider

Guidance

Full details of the approval and monitoring process can be found in Annex F of MSN 1865, as amended.

You must ensure that you’re able to meet the quality management system (QMS) conditions as detailed in sections A-J of the MSN.

Further information is available in MIN 643.

Course criteria

Training centres must meet the course criteria requirements developed by the Merchant Navy Training Board (MNTB) in conjunction with the MCA. These are contained in a series of booklets, relevant copies of which must be purchased from the MNTB prior to application: https://shop.witherbys.com/shipping-bodies/mntb/

A few syllabuses are published by the MCA (on gov.uk) which can be found on our syllabus page.

Boatmasters’ Licence (BML) syllabuses can be found at Annex 7 of MSN 1853, as amended.

Cyber security syllabus is available on request, please email stc.courses@mcga.gov.uk

Audit fees

In line with HM Treasury’s ‘Managing Public Money’ guidelines, we operate on a cost recovery basis. The audit fee is currently £147 per hour and is set by legislation.

For overseas audits, the hourly rate also applies to the time spent travelling and there are other costs such as flights, hotels and daily subsistence to factor in.

For a rough guide as to how long an audit might take: add 4 hours (for our Surveyor/Examiner to review your desktop submission) to the total training duration of the course(s). If we go ahead with your request, we will be able to provide you with an estimated cost.

ThereAdditionally, there are also ongoing costs in maintaining approvals, for example, being reaudited every 5 years (‘reapproval’) and for overseas providers, we also carry out a ‘midterm’ (halfway) audit. These furthersubsequent audits are generally not as extensive as the initial approval audit.

We do not charge for Boatmasters’ Licence (BML) course approvals, however, we must be able to justify an audit.

Request

How to request MCA short course approvalapproval(s)

As a general rule, local Marine Offices oversee mandatory STCW courses delivered in person within UK training centres, while MCA Headquarters (Seafarer Technical Delivery Team) oversee courses delivered online, peripatetically, or overseas, as well as voluntary approvals and certain specialist courses such as NAEST.

Requests overseen by MCA Headquarters

Due to the demandvolume forof new course approvalsapproval andrequests, alongside the ongoing need to monitorregularly audit a large number of existing overseas training providers,providers to maintain quality standards, we willoperate assessa yourprioritisation requestframework. againstThis ourapproach ensures that new approval requests are handled in a fair and quality-focused manner, with priority given based on strategic and operational needs.

To support this, a panel meets monthly to consider requests, which are assessed having regard to current operational priorities and resource availability.

Requests are assigned one of the following priority levels:

High priority	Requests linked to urgent safety, regulatory or UK Government needs. These are progressed subject to Examiner availability.
Medium priority	Requests that support the UK’s strategic interests. These are typically planned for the next financial year (April to March).
Low priority	Requests that align less strongly with operational priorities but may be progressed if they can be tied-in with another planned audit.
Not a current priority	Requests that do not currently align with operational priorities. IfThese yourare requestkept isunder rejected,review should circumstances or priorities change.
Rejected	Some requests cannot be taken forward due to external or policy constraints. Where this applies, we will provideexplain the reason(s)reason.

To behindsupport ourfair decision.and consistent decision‑making, a panel meets monthly to consider requests, which are assessed having regard to current operational priorities and resource availability.

Online request form

If you do not hold any MCA course approvals, please complete theour online request form:

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Common approval queries

‘One day firefighting’

This normally refers to BML Fire Safety. The MCAsyllabus for this can be found in Annex 7 of MSN 1853, as amended.

Entry into Enclosed Spaces

This does not approveneed to be MCA-approved. Please refer to MGN 659, as amended.

Crowd Management or Passenger Spaces

The givenMCA does not approve these as they must be ship specific (as per section 17 of MSN 1866, as amended).

Shipboard Safety Officer

This is not mandatory so does not need to be MCA approved, however, MCA approved may make more sense for working on board UK flagged vessels given it covers UK health and safety legislation.

How to find MCA approved courses

Raising a complaint against a MCA training provider

Our role

Training providers must have a complaints process in place as part of their Quality Management System (which we check). Training providers must also keep records of complaints which we check during an audit. 

Additionally, we consider complaints which allege:

• poor standards of training

• serious health & safety issues

• course(s) being delivered at location(s) or by person(s) not approved by us

• fraud or illegal activity

If your complaint falls within our remit, please outline your complaint by email to stc.courses@mcga.gov.uk and attach any supporting evidence.

Complaints about other matters should be raised with the training provider directly. We are also not responsible for pricing; our role is to oversee the standards of training.