This article examines the charterer’s obligations relating to the use of a crewed yacht, understood as a pleasure vessel employed exclusively for recreational and leisure purposes, which is time chartered - neither demise nor bareboat chartered, under the MYBA Yacht Charter Agreement 2025 and which is treated as a ship for the purposes of private maritime law, as evidenced by registration under an IMO number. While disputes in yacht chartering are frequently framed in financial or technical terms, practice shows that many conflicts arise from disagreements as to what the charterer is contractually entitled to do with the yacht during the charter period and under what conditions that entitlement may be restricted. In this context, the article addresses three closely connected questions: First, the contractual meaning of “use of the yacht” under the MYBA 2025 standard terms; second, the identification and systematisation of the specific charterer’s obligations through which that use is defined and constrained; and third, the extent to which the 2025 revision incorporates public law related conditions - most notably the KYC, AML and sanctions screening, as contractual obligations affecting the practical enjoyment of the yacht. Methodologically, the article adopts a doctrinal contract-law approach, based on English common law, treating MYBA 2025 as the primary normative reference and usingearlier MYBA versions and established charterparty doctrine only by analogy. It argues that MYBA 2025 does not define “use” as an unfettered right of enjoyment, but as a functionally bounded entitlement, mediated through the captain’s authority and conditioned by legality, conduct and compliance. In doing so, the article clarifies the internal logic of the MYBA 2025 use-of-yacht framework and contributes to a more coherent understanding of charterer obligations in contemporary crewed yacht chartering. By treating “use” as a legally conditioned entitlement rather than a residual freedom, the article provides a doctrinal framework for understanding why behavioural and compliance breaches under MYBA 2025 can justify restriction or termination even in the absence of physical damage.
Voudouris et al. (Thu,) studied this question.