The Ship Risk Profile (SRP) is the Paris MoU's targeting system. Every ship in the region's database is classed as low, standard or high risk based on seven weighted parameters, and that class sets how often Port State Control inspects the ship: every 5 to 6 months at high risk, every 24 to 36 months at low risk.
What is the ship risk profile?
The Ship Risk Profile is the mechanism in Annex 7 of the Paris MoU Memorandum that decides three things for every foreign ship trading to the region: its priority for inspection, the interval between inspections, and the scope of the inspection it gets. It replaced the old target-factor system when the New Inspection Regime came in, and it is the reason PSC attention is so unevenly distributed. A well-run ship on a white-listed flag can trade for two or three years between boardings while a high risk ship is boarded at nearly every other port call.
The profile is not static. It is recalculated daily overnight, again after every inspection, and whenever the annual flag and recognised organisation performance tables change. A detention today changes tomorrow's targeting. That is why preparation guides like our PSC inspection preparation routine treat every boarding as an investment in the next three years, not a one-off event.
How is a ship classed as low, standard or high risk?
A ship is a High Risk Ship (HRS) when its criteria add up to 5 or more weighting points. It is a Low Risk Ship (LRS) only when it meets all of the low-risk criteria and has had at least one inspection in the previous 36 months. Everything else is a Standard Risk Ship (SRS), and in practice most of the world fleet sits there.
The low-risk bar is deliberately hard to clear. The ship must fly a white-listed flag whose state has completed the IMO audit, be run by a high-performing ISM company, have recorded 5 or fewer deficiencies at each inspection in the last 36 months, and have no detention in that period. Its certificates must also come from the right place: either a recognised organisation rated high performance and recognised by the EU under Directive 2009/15/EC, or the flag Administration itself, where the flag issues every statutory certificate and no RO is involved. Miss any one criterion, or simply go uninspected for 36 months, and the ship drops back to standard risk.
Note the asymmetry: deficiencies can cost a ship its low-risk status, but they carry no weighting points toward high risk. A ship reaches high risk through what it is (type, age, flag) and through detentions and poor company performance, not through deficiency counts alone.
Which factors drive the risk profile?
Seven parameters feed the calculation, split between generic (what the ship is) and historic (what its record shows). Table 1 of Annex 7 assigns the weightings:
| Parameter | High risk criteria | Points | Low risk criteria |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type of ship | Chemical tanker, gas carrier, oil tanker, NLS tanker and their combinations, bulk carrier, combination carrier, passenger ship, ro-ro passenger ship, high speed passenger craft | 2 | All types eligible |
| Age of ship | More than 12 years, any type | 1 | All ages eligible |
| Flag | Black list, very high to medium-to-high risk band | 2 | White list, and flag state has completed the IMO audit |
| Flag | Black list, medium risk band | 1 | (as above) |
| Recognised organisation | Performance low or very low | 1 | Performance high and EU-recognised, or all certificates issued by the flag itself |
| Company (ISM) performance | Low or very low | 2 | High |
| Deficiencies | Not eligible for points | 0 | 5 or fewer recorded in each inspection within previous 36 months |
| Detentions | 2 or more within previous 36 months | 1 | No detention within previous 36 months |
The arithmetic is unforgiving for certain profiles. A 13-year-old bulk carrier already carries 3 points from type and age. Put it on a black-listed flag in the higher risk bands and it sits at 5: high risk before a single inspection result is counted. A tanker operator with a low-performing company rating is in the same position. The generic parameters are slow to change, which is exactly why the historic ones, detentions and company performance, are where an operator's own actions move the needle.
How often is a ship inspected at each risk level?
Annex 8 sets the periodic inspection windows. High risk ships become due between 5 and 6 months after their last inspection in the region, standard risk ships between 10 and 12 months, and low risk ships between 24 and 36 months. Once the window closes, the ship becomes Priority I and member states must inspect it at the next port call. Inside the window it is Priority II and may be inspected at the port state's discretion.
The risk profile also drives inspection depth. High risk ships are due expanded inspections, which cover more risk areas and take longer, and overriding factors such as a reported deficiency, a collision, or an ISM-related complaint can trigger an additional inspection at any time regardless of the window. A detention therefore compounds: the ship is inspected more often, more deeply, and with a record that invites closer attention. Three detentions can end in a regional ban, an escalation covered in detail in what a PSC detention actually costs.
How do you check a ship's current profile?
The Paris MoU publishes a ship risk calculator on its website, alongside the current company performance calculation and the list of recognised organisations meeting the low-risk criteria. Enter the ship's parameters and the tool returns the profile. Inspection histories sit in THETIS, the information system EMSA hosts for the region, and the annual flag lists apply from 1 July each year to 30 June the next, so a flag's reclassification each summer can shift a whole fleet's profiles overnight.
Two practical notes. First, deficiencies marked as accidental damage are excluded from the calculation, so a properly documented damage finding does not poison the profile. Second, the Tokyo MoU runs a similar but not identical system for the Asia-Pacific, with different thresholds and shorter windows; the differences are mapped in Tokyo MoU vs Paris MoU. A fleet manager should know both profiles for any ship trading across regions, and should check them before a port call, not after a targeting letter arrives. The same profile logic decides how hard a themed campaign lands too, as the Concentrated Inspection Campaign guide shows for the 2026 cargo securing CIC.
How does company performance affect the whole fleet?
Company performance is the parameter operators most often underestimate, because it is the only one a single ship can damage for every other ship in the fleet. The Paris MoU calculates it for the ISM company (the DOC holder) across all ships the company is responsible for, on a running 36-month window, combining a deficiency index and a detention index into a matrix that rates the company very low, low, medium or high.
A company rated low or very low adds 2 weighting points to every ship in its fleet, which is enough on its own to push an older tanker or bulker to high risk. And the rule at the sharp end: if a refusal-of-access order (a ban) is issued to any ship in the fleet within the last 36 months, the company's detention index is automatically set to "above average" regardless of every other result. One chronically bad ship raises the inspection burden, and the commercial exposure, of every vessel sharing its DOC.
This is why fleet-level visibility of inspection readiness is a shore-side problem, not a per-ship one. The record that drives the profile is built one deficiency and one detention at a time, across the whole fleet, and the office usually learns about the gaps only after they are in THETIS.