HIN 101 For Boat Owners
I originally wrote this in 2009 for my website. Times marches on, so I have updated it. I have made some editorial changes but the information it contains is still valid.
HINs can be confusing to boat owners, especially on older boats that weren’t required to have them, home built boats, and imported boats. This is not normally an issue with a brand new boat. Since 1972 most new boats are assigned an HIN by the manufacturer who puts it on the transom, or at or near the stern on boats with no transom. It is also in a second concealed location. The regulations were intended to apply to boat builders and manufacturers, not boat owners. But boat owners are involved because all the US states include the HIN in their registration process and require an HIN on every boat, even old, home made, and imported boats.
HIN Basics.
In 1972 the Federal Boat Safety Act became law, and to implement it the U. S. Coast Guard was required to propose regulations for the safe construction of recreational boats. The HIN was required so the Coast Guard could determine who the manufacturer was and if a boat was in compliance with the regulations when it was made
Every recreational boat manufactured, imported, or home built in the USA and Canada, and many other countries, has a Hull Identification Number (HIN). This is a unique number identifying each boat, in much the same way that every automobile has a Vehicle Identification Number (VIN). The US and Canadian rules for HINs are the same. The US and Canada have a shared Manufacturer Identification Code (MIC) database. All Canadian HINs are valid in the US and vice versa. Since 1972 the USA and Canada have assigned approximately 40,000 MICs. At any one time only about 4500 manufacturers are active, but companies go in and out of business daily. Usually, the Coast Guard will not reassign a MIC for an out of business manufacturer for ten years.
A HIN looks like this:
ABC12345L409
It is a twelve digit number. The first three letters are the Manufacturer Identification Code (MIC) The last four numbers show the date of certification. The date of certification is the date the manufacturer certifies that the boat meets all the regulations that the particular boat has to meet. However, to most people, the last four digits simply indicate when the boat was built and what model year it is. Look here for the US Coast Guard version of HIN 101. http://www.uscgboating.org/library/boating-safety-circulars/BSC70.pdf#basics . You can look up a manufacturer here. http://www.uscgboating.org/content/manufacturers-identification.php
The states are required to assign HINs to all recreational boats that do not have a valid HIN. Each state is assigned its own MIC to use when assigning a HIN. State MICs all start with the state abbreviation, such as NY, NJ, WN, FL, and end in Z. The abbreviations used are not the US Postal Service abbreviations. They are the abbreviations used for boat registrations, established in 1958 before the US Postal Service created state abbreviations. For example, a boat given a HIN by Washington state would start with WNZ. https://www.ncwildlife.org/Portals/5/documents/state_prefixes.pdf
The HIN on a new boat is assigned by the builder or manufacturer. They keep a list of who the boats were sold to, by HIN. This is an effective tool for recalls, and for law enforcement checking bogus HINs.
So, what does it all mean? In the above example ABC is the MIC.
The next five characters are anything the builder wants to assign. It can be 12345, or 00001, or 0000A, or 32001. Whatever they want to put in there except: O, I or Q. These characters look too much like zeros or ones. Some manufacturers use a sort of code in this area. For instance, if they build a thirty footer and this is the first one then they would use 30001. Others just assign consecutive numbers, 00001, 00002, 00003, etc.
The ninth character identifies the month when the boat was certified (or built) as shown in the chart below. If it's built in May the ninth character would be an E.
It works like this:
A: January
B: February
C: March
D: April
E: May
F: June
G: July
H: August
I: September (yes it's an I, but it's ok)
J: October
K: November
L: December
The tenth character is the last digit of the year when the boat was certified (or built). For example, if the year is 1997 then the tenth character would be a 7, or if it is the year 2009, it would be a nine.
The date of certification is the date the manufacturer certifies that the boat meets all the regulations that the boat must comply with. A manufacturer is also required to certify, by placing a label on the boat, that it complies with all the regulations that apply to that boat. The label says:
This boat complies with US Coast Guard Safety Standards in effect on the date of certification.
The date of certification is the last four numbers on the HIN.
For boats that have a capacity label this certification statement is combined with that label. But for boats that do not have a capacity label it is usually at or near the helm station. The date of certification can be anytime between when the boat was begun until the date it leaves the place of build. The law says the date of certification and the HIN, must be on the boat before it is sold, offered for sale, or entered interstate commerce.
Model Years:
What does this have to do with model year?
The last two characters are the model year. Since the ninth and tenth characters are the date of certification, the model year must agree with that date. In the USA the model year is defined in the Code of Federal regulations; Effective model year 2019
"On February 8, 2016 Congress included a provision within the Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2015 that moved the start of the recreational boat model year from August 1st to June 1st, extending through July 31st of the following year. This change allows for a 14-month model year window for recreational boats, and the definition of model year can now be found in Title 46 U.S. Code, Chapter 4302. " USCG Boating Safety Circular #91 Dated Fall 2018
46 U.S. Code § 4302 - Regulations
(e)
(1)Under this section, a model year for recreational vessels and associated equipment shall, except as provided in paragraph (2)—
(A) begin on June 1 of a year and end on July 31 of the following year; and
(B) be designated by the year in which it ends.
(2) Upon the request of a recreational vessel manufacturer to which this chapter applies, the Secretary may alter a model year for a model of recreational vessel of the manufacturer and associated equipment, by no more than 6 months from the model year described in paragraph (1).
Prior to this model year was defined as:
33 CFR 181.3 Model year means the period beginning August 1 of any year and ending on July 31 of the following year. Each Model year is designated by the year in which it ends.
Most manufacturers started their model year in August. However, some used June or July. One even started in May. For instance, a boat that was built between June, 1989 and May 31, 1990, would have been labeled a 1990 model. But their model year began on June 1 and ended on May 31 of the next year. That is, the model year on the HIN must fall within the year the model year ends. “Each Model year is designated by the year in which it ends.”
In 2009 the USCG ruled that the model year would be enforced as written, because some were ignoring the law. The model year must begin and end in accordance with the regulation. If the boat is a 2000 model year it shouldn’t say 1997 or if a boat is a 1997 model year it should not have a model year of 2000. If it was built between August 1 of 2000, and July 31 of 2001, then it is a 2001 model year. Now, if it is a 2020 model year the model year must start on June 1 of 2019 and end on July 31 2020. Yes, this is a 14 month model year. This is what Congress put in the law. If the model year differs from the date of certification, every time someone tries to register that boat, the state will flag it for checking. The cops will come and start asking nosy questions. Also, the owner will have a difficult time insuring the boat. The insurance agent will suspect some sort of fraud if the model year is significantly different from the actual year built.
The exception is a boat that takes longer than a year to build. Since this is really the date of certification, then the HIN does not have to be put on until the boat is finished and ready to leave the place of build. In a large vessel this could be several years from the start of construction. So, even though they started in 2019, if the boat was not finished until 2023, then it could be a 2022 model year or even a 2023 if it was finished after June 1, 2022.
There have been some additions to the HIN since 1984. A builder can add info before and after the number. For instance, many imported boats have a two character country code before the number. This is a boat made in France. (By the way, it is not valid in the US)
Below is a boat built in the USA. If the country code was CA, it would be Canada. The International Standards Organization (ISO) publishes a list of country codes. http://userpage.chemie.fu-berlin.de/diverse/doc/ISO_3166.html
Additionally, they can put up to five characters after the HIN.
US - ABC12345L495 - H3266
Complicating the issue, the HIN has become a tool for law enforcement agencies to detect stolen boats, insurance fraud and other crimes. Insurance companies use the HIN to identify specific boats. The International Association of Marine Investigators has been trying for years to get the last five digits adopted by the US and the EU. The Coast Guard has decided to not pursue getting the HIN regulation changed to a 17 or 19 digit number. It is rare to see a 17 or 19 character HIN but they do exist. The last five characters are a coded description of the boat and especially useful in tracking stolen boats.
The following content is for paid subscribers: It covers old HINs assigned before 1984 (they are different), HINs for home built boats and boats built before 1972, where to put an HIN, foreign HINs, and altered HINs.
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