The $24,000 Fee That’s Emptying St. Thomas Marinas

Correction, Oct. 5, 2026: An earlier version of this article said BVI-based yachts are capped at seven pickups or drop-offs in the USVI. No such USVI or federal limit exists. The BVI limits foreign based (non-BVI-based yachts) under 115 feet to no more than 7 pickups/charter starts originating in the BVI. This article has been updated with that correction and with further detail on the BVI fee structure from Kennon Jones, executive director of the Virgin Islands Professional Charter Association (VIPCA).

American Yacht Harbor in Red Hook has been the physical center of St. Thomas’s charter and sportfishing fleet for decades — the dock where the old Boy Scout marlin tournament weighed in, and the base for much of the day-charter business that keeps the marina’s slips full. Right now, that fleet is caught in the middle of a dispute between two governments that has been building, in cycles, for at least four years.

What follows is what’s verifiable, in order.

2020–2022: A pandemic head start

When COVID-19 hit, the British Virgin Islands imposed stricter and longer-lasting travel restrictions than the U.S. Virgin Islands did. The USVI, reachable more easily from the U.S. mainland and open sooner, became the region’s default charter-yacht destination during that window. Some of the biggest names in the business adapted to it directly: The Moorings, one of the world’s largest charter operators, extended its operations into St. Thomas, and BVI Yacht Charters soft-opened a new USVI base. Neither the total length of BVI’s closure nor a complete list of relocating operators is something ALL AT SEA has independently confirmed — but the direction of the shift, BVI-based charter capacity moving toward the USVI during the pandemic, is documented.

2022: The first flare-up

By November 2022, the two governments were already in a standoff over BVI trade-license and work-permit requirements for foreign charter operators and crew. Governor Albert Bryan Jr. threatened to regulate BVI-based vessel access to the USVI in response. BVI Premier Natalio Wheatley later said his government moved to eliminate those trade-license and work-permit requirements specifically to head off USVI retaliation. That resolution held for about three years.

February 2025: Fees replace permits as the flashpoint, and Bryan threatens tariffs

New BVI legislation moving through the House of Assembly proposed raising the BVI’s foreign charter vessel fee from $400 to $800 a year, depending on length, to $24,000, and the day-sail operator fee from $200 to $12,500. In response, Bryan called an emergency legislative session to propose a 25% retaliatory tariff on BVI goods. At a Virgin Islands Professional Charter Association (VIPCA) meeting around the same time, one USVI charter operator reported a 70% drop in business; the industry’s economic contribution to the USVI was then cited at more than $100 million annually.

March–April 2025: A pause, then a revision

Bryan and Wheatley met in the BVI and agreed to temporarily hold the new fees while reviewing the numbers. Wheatley committed to “crunch the numbers to ensure that we maintain equity.” The revised structure he presented that April kept the top-tier unlimited annual fee for foreign charter yachts under 115 feet at $24,000, added lower-cost options for boats making fewer trips, trimmed the day-charter operator fee from the original $12,500 proposal to $8,500, and set water-taxi licenses at $2,500.

June 1, 2025: The new fees take effect

The revised BVI Commercial Recreational Vessel License framework went into force. For a foreign charter yacht under 115 feet, the unlimited annual fee had risen 30- to 60-fold from pre-2025 rates of $400 to $800; the day-charter fee had risen more than 40-fold from $200.

How the fees break down by size

The BVI’s framework prices foreign (non-BVI-based) term and crewed charter yachts by length, and the smallest yachts pay the most. According to VIPCA, a yacht under 115 feet has three options:

• $24,000 a year for unlimited entries, with no more than seven charter pickups in the BVI and eight days per entry.
• $7,500 a year for up to seven charters, or $1,200 per charter.
• $7,500 plus $2,100 for each charter beyond seven.

Yachts over 115 feet pay either an annual fee or a per-charter fee. Either way, there is no limit on their time in BVI waters or on charter pickups:

• 115 to 150 feet: $7,500 a year, or $2,000 per charter.
• 150 to 250 feet: $8,500 a year, or $2,500 per charter.
• Over 250 feet: $10,000 a year, or $3,500 per charter.

The license fees come on top of the payroll, income, gross-receipts and other taxes vessel owners already pay in their home jurisdictions.

That inversion is one of the industry’s main grievances. “Why would a 45-foot catamaran pay 2.4 times what a 251-foot yacht pays?” asks Kennon Jones, executive director of VIPCA. He argues that the gap undercuts the BVI government’s case that the fees are about a fair share and a fair price. Jones says that when Wheatley was asked about the gap at an April 7, 2026, meeting on the license fees, he said the “massive price discrepancy was done intentionally.” VIPCA has posted a recording of the meeting.

Foreign-based vessels must also engage a BVI agent as their local representative, and pay 2% of gross charter fees for doing so.

Bareboat operators fall under a separate set of rules. USVI bareboat companies are limited to seven BVI entries per boat per season, with no more than four days per entry. The alternative is to license under the crewed schedule above, paying the same fees plus the cost of having each boat inspected as a commercial vessel rather than a recreational one.

Day-charter operators face a different problem. A vessel can hold only one type of BVI license, and USVI day-charter boats have traditionally run water-taxi service as well. A USVI day-charter boat pays $8,500 for its day-charter license (the same as a 200-foot yacht) and cannot also carry a $2,500 water-taxi license. Jones says the result is that the inter-island ferrying market, carrying charter, hotel and other guests between the two territories, has effectively gone to BVI water-taxi operators.

June 2025: The traffic starts moving the other way

Within weeks, USVI-based operators began relocating to the BVI to escape being classified as “foreign” vessels there. VIPCA documented &Beyond Yacht Charters moving its entire 21-vessel fleet to Virgin Gorda — its CEO cited the $24,000 fee as unworkable given that roughly 99% of his clients wanted BVI itineraries — and identified at least two other USVI charter companies doing the same. VIPCA’s response was to ask the USVI government for reciprocal fees on BVI-based vessels and stricter compliance enforcement, not for the BVI to reverse course.

The BVI-side limits on pickups aren’t new. The seven-pickup cap for non-BVI-based yachts under 115 feet has long been standard, according to Jones, and is not itself a point of contention in the current dispute. The BVI also restricts its own fleet. From December 1 through April 30, BVI-based vessels on itineraries that include the BVI may make no more than four pickups outside the territory, must start at least 70% of their charters in the BVI, and must spend an average of at least 15 days a month in BVI waters, including at least five consecutive days. Neither the USVI government nor the federal government limits how many charters a BVI-based yacht may start from USVI ports. What’s in dispute is the fee structure, not the pickup limits. (For the view from the charter operators themselves on the USVI side, BWSailing’s account of the fee structure’s effect on individual businesses is worth a look, though it presents only their side.)

December 2025: It goes federal

The U.S. Trade Representative’s 16th Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act (CBERA) Report to Congress flagged the BVI’s fee changes as a “trade-distorting measure,” citing an estimated 5,000 USVI jobs and $166 million in local economic contribution tied to marine tourism, and noted that USVI operators had been forced to close or relocate as a result. The report raised the possibility that BVI could lose CBERA trade benefits if the measure stood.

January 2026: A BVI voice urges caution — from inside the BVI

Myron Walwyn, leader of the BVI’s opposition, publicly urged his own government to negotiate with the USVI before the dispute drew in federal intervention that could, in his words, extend “beyond fees alone” to matters like visa waiver access. His comments show the BVI government’s position isn’t without internal BVI critics.

April 2026: An industry group sounds the alarm on both the numbers and the exodus

Project Fair Waters, a marine-industry coalition led by Kosei Ohno, proposed a CPI-indexed alternative fee (around $1,900 a year rather than $24,000) and reciprocal unlimited access between the two territories. The coalition estimated more than 300 vessels had shifted operations from the USVI to the BVI since the June 2025 fee change took effect — a figure ALL AT SEA has not independently verified, sourced to the coalition’s own count.

September 2026: Six federal agencies, an ultimatum, and an unresolved deadline

At a September 17 meeting in Washington, representatives from the Departments of the Interior, State, Homeland Security, and Commerce, plus the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and the Small Business Administration, raised questions about the BVI framework’s effects on U.S.-flagged vessels, businesses, and passengers. The next day, Bryan formally proposed an emergency Inter-Virgin Islands Council meeting in Washington with federal agencies participating, and asked for the BVI government’s written confirmation by September 25. On that date, Bryan publicly called the fees “silly,” said he had been seeking a meeting with BVI officials for roughly 18 months without success, and put the cost to the USVI yacht industry at more than $100 million in lost revenue.

Where it stands today

As of this writing, ALL AT SEA has not been able to confirm whether the BVI government met Bryan’s September 25 deadline, or the final date of the proposed Washington meeting — reporting has referenced both “the week of October 12” and an “October 2” session, and we haven’t been able to reconcile which is current.

On the ground in St. Thomas, the visible effect has already reached beyond the charter fleet: the Virgin Islands Game Fishing Club, which revived a release-scored blue marlin tournament in 2025 for the first time since the old Boy Scout tournament faded out around 2018, did not run it again this year, a decision that tracks with the same North Drop access questions driving the larger dispute.

I know you have an opinion… Chime in below in the comments

Chris Kennan has written for ALL AT SEA since 2005.