On a fully crewed charter the price you were quoted is not the price you pay, and the gap is not a hidden fee — it is a fund. The advance provisioning allowance is money you hand over before departure so that the captain can buy things on your behalf during the week, with the balance returned afterwards.
Once you see it as a prepaid float rather than a charge, the whole structure becomes straightforward. Until then it looks like a 30 per cent surcharge nobody warned you about.
What the base fee buys, and what it does not
The base charter fee covers the yacht, the crew and the insurance. That is the whole list in most contracts.
It does not cover anything you consume. Fuel for the main engines, the generator, the tender and the water toys. Food and drink. Berths and port dues. Shore excursions, a dive instructor for an afternoon, the case of a particular wine somebody asked for. All of that is route-dependent and guest-dependent, and none of it can be priced before you decide what the week looks like.
Which is the reason the mechanism exists. Two groups take the same yacht for the same seven days: one anchors, eats simply and barely moves; the other marina-hops, runs the generator for air conditioning all night and orders accordingly. The operator cannot quote a single number that is fair to both.
What percentage, and why the sources disagree
You will see figures from 20 to 50 per cent of the base fee, which is unhelpful until you know what moves it.
Under the standard MYBA terms used across the Mediterranean the usual bands are roughly 25 to 35 per cent for sailing yachts and catamarans, and 35 to 40 per cent for motor yachts. The difference is almost entirely fuel.
It goes higher when the route is long, when the yacht is thirsty, or when the guests’ requests are elaborate. It goes lower on a sailing boat staying in one archipelago. In the Caribbean the convention is different again — costs are frequently rolled into a single all-inclusive fee, which is why advice written for that market does not transfer.
The percentage is an estimate made by the broker, not a tariff. If it looks high for the week you have described, ask what it assumes.
Fuel and berths are the whole story
Everything else in the fund is small by comparison.
Fuel on a planing motor yacht can reach hundreds of litres an hour at cruising speed, and the single biggest influence you have on the APA is how far and how fast the boat moves. Three long passages and a week of generator running will drain a fund that a quiet week would barely touch. The mechanics are the same as on a smaller boat, described in how fuel is charged, with the difference that here it comes out of the float rather than your pocket at the pump.
Berths are the second line, and on a large yacht they are not the figures in standard mooring fees — a thirty-metre boat in a fashionable harbour in August is in a different market. A week that alternates anchorages with marinas costs a fraction of a week that berths every night, and that is a conversation to have with the captain on the first evening rather than a discovery on the final statement.
How it is accounted for
This is the part that reassures people, and it is worth knowing your entitlement.
The captain keeps every receipt and produces an itemised statement at the end of the charter. Under MYBA terms, purchases are passed on at cost — there is no markup on the wine or the diesel. What is left is refunded.
If the fund runs low mid-week, the captain asks you to top it up rather than curtailing the itinerary. That is normal and not a sign of mismanagement; it usually means the week went further than the estimate assumed. If spending exceeds the fund and is not topped up during the charter, the balance is settled afterwards.
Two things worth asking your broker for in advance: a sample APA statement, so you know what the final account looks like, and confirmation of when the APA is due. Timing varies — commonly with the final balance several weeks before departure, sometimes closer to the date.
A worked week
Numbers make this concrete. Take a base fee of €60,000 for a crewed motor yacht in the Adriatic in September.
VAT in Croatia at 13 per cent adds €7,800. An APA at 35 per cent is €21,000, paid before departure. Gratuity at 12 per cent is €7,200 at the end. The cash you need is therefore around €96,000, of which the €21,000 is a float rather than a cost.
Now spend that float two ways. A week of three long passages, nightly berths in the better harbours and a generous bar runs the fund out entirely and may need a top-up — the fuel alone could be €9,000 to €12,000 and the berths another €5,000. A week based in one archipelago, anchoring four nights and moving two hours a day, might use €11,000 of it and refund €10,000.
Same yacht, same crew, same seven days, a €10,000 difference decided entirely by the itinerary. That is the single most useful thing to understand about the mechanism, and it is why the conversation on the first evening is worth having.
What to say to the captain on day one
Be specific, because a captain with no instructions will default to the predictable choices: marinas, because they are safe and easy, and provisioning at the generous end, because nobody is ever thanked for a thin fridge.
Four sentences cover it. Say whether you would rather anchor than berth where conditions allow. Say whether you care about covering distance or would rather stay in one area. Say roughly what you want to drink and eat, including anything you will not touch. And say if there is a number you would like to come back under.
None of that is awkward and all of it is normal. It also helps with the things that genuinely need notice — dietary requirements are far easier to meet when they are known before provisioning rather than after, and activities like diving or fishing come out of the fund and need arranging.
What it is not
It is not a tip. Gratuity is separate, customarily 10 to 15 per cent of the base fee in the Mediterranean, and paid at the end. See tipping the crew.
It is not VAT. Tax is charged on the charter fee and differs by country — broadly 13 per cent in Croatia, lower in Greece on commercially licensed vessels, above 20 per cent in France, Italy and Spain. How the price is built sets out where each element sits.
It is not a security deposit. A deposit is held against damage and returned intact; an APA is spent. On smaller charters you meet the deposit instead — see how that works.
It is not the local fixed charges. Tourist tax, transit logs and park fees are their own small category, described in the paperwork nobody mentions.
When you will and will not meet it
You will meet an APA on a fully crewed yacht — a large motoryacht, a crewed catamaran in the Ionian, a gulet on the Turkish coast where the convention is often a simpler all-inclusive rate instead. Crewed Turkish gulets and crewed Croatian motor yachts are where most people encounter the term for the first time.
You will not meet it on a bareboat or skippered charter of a standard sailing yacht. There you pay fuel and berths as you go, which is more work and more transparent, and the skipper’s fee is a separate daily line — see what a skipper covers and the three formats compared.
Nor on a day charter, where the price is close to complete and nothing is prepaid for later — one of several ways a day is a different product.
The practical summary
Budget the base fee, plus VAT, plus 30 to 40 per cent for the APA, plus 10 to 15 per cent for gratuity. That is the realistic all-in number, and the APA portion is partly refundable.
Then influence it deliberately: fewer long passages, more anchorages, and a frank conversation with the captain about what you would rather spend money on. Crews who do that routinely get several thousand euros back. Crews who treat the fund as spent generally find it was.
If you are comparing formats or countries with this in mind, the all-in totals differ more than the headline rates: Croatia, Greece, Italy and the French Riviera each behave differently, and what is included is the baseline for all of them.