A RightShip reassessment is a request, backed by documentation, for RightShip to review something it has assessed: a Safety Score rule, a deficiency severity grade, an incident record. You submit evidence through the platform or to info@rightship.com; RightShip reviews and decides. This guide covers the procedure, and the validity rules that usually sit behind the problem.
What is a RightShip reassessment and when do you need one?
It is the formal way to put new information in front of RightShip after an assessment has gone against the vessel. The common triggers are a Safety Score that dropped when a rule fired, a PSC deficiency graded more severely than the facts support, or an incident record still showing open when the work is done. RightShip's help centre states the route plainly: "you may submit a request with supporting documentation to info@rightship.com", and the team assesses it case by case or through periodic reviews.
Before filing anything, read the vessel page. RightShip displays which rule fired and its road to resolution, and that tells you whether you need a reassessment at all. Two detentions inside 24 months resolve by time or by inspection, not by correspondence; an inspection-related rule resolves by booking one, not by disputing it. A reassessment request is for when the record is wrong or incomplete. When the record is right, the road to resolution is the only road, and the fastest version of it is usually an acceptable inspection. If the score mechanics behind your drop are unclear, start with how the Safety Score is calculated.
How long is a RightShip inspection valid?
Between 3 and 12 months. RightShip's validity matrix, published in its help centre, assigns each acceptable inspection a validity of 3, 6, 9 or 12 months; a bad enough result is unacceptable outright, which triggers its own Safety Score rule and requires reinspection. Twelve months is the ceiling for a vessel that substantially meets the RISQ with a strong close-out; three months is the floor for a vessel that scraped through.
Validity is not a formality. It sets when the vessel next faces the cost and scheduling risk of an inspection, and under the age trigger it determines when rule SS2-5 comes back. A 3-month validity on an 11-year-old bulk carrier means running this whole cycle four times a year.
What decides whether you get the longer or shorter validity?
Three elements, per RightShip's validity criteria: the severity of findings (high, medium or low), the number of findings, and the quality of the close-out submission, graded good, average or poor. The published matrix for a good close-out illustrates the mechanics:
| Findings at inspection | Close-out quality: good | Validity |
|---|---|---|
| Up to 23 low or medium risk, at most 1 high risk | Good | 12 months |
| More than 23 low or medium, no high risk | Good | 9 months |
| Up to 23 low or medium, 2 high risk | Good | 9 months |
| More than 23 low or medium, 1 high risk | Good | 6 months |
| Up to 23 findings, 3 high risk | Good | 6 months |
| More than 6 high risk | Any | Unacceptable |
Drop the close-out quality to average or poor and every band tightens; with a poor submission, 12 months is not available at all. Note the two multipliers hidden in the fine print. Repeat findings from the previous inspection count against you. And in navigation and machinery space, RightShip's data-driven cluster rule can treat every fourth low or medium finding as the equivalent of one high risk finding, a point covered in the chapter-by-chapter RISQ walkthrough.
One recent change matters here. RightShip's validity criteria record that from 17 June 2026 it removed the automatic effect of show-stopper findings on Safety Scores and inspection outcomes; all findings now receive standardised severity ratings. A single dramatic finding no longer sinks the result by itself. The severity framework decides.
How do you request a reassessment or dispute a severity rating?
Procedurally, in this order:
- Identify exactly what you are disputing: a rule trigger, a severity grade, an open record. Screenshot the vessel page as it stands.
- Assemble the documentation that addresses that specific point: the PSC report and close-out evidence for a severity dispute, class and flag records for a factual error, dated photographic evidence for a condition question.
- Submit through the platform where a submission channel exists (RightShip superintendent requests land there directly), otherwise to info@rightship.com with the vessel's IMO number and a short factual cover note.
- Expect assessment "as part of ongoing case-by-case reviews or through periodic reassessments", RightShip's phrasing, which means an answer may not be immediate. Chase through the same channel, not around it.
For PSC severity grades specifically: every deficiency from inspections on or after 20 August 2025 is graded high, medium or low by an AI-assisted analysis with final review by a RightShip subject matter expert. The grade is disputable through the route above. A dispute argues the record: what the deficiency text says, what the rectification evidence shows, how comparable deficiencies are graded. If the grade traces back to a Paris MoU deficiency, have the vessel's Ship Risk Profile context to hand as well, since the PSC record drives both systems.
What evidence does RightShip expect to close a finding?
Four things, and it grades you on them. RightShip's guidance on close-out reports asks for the original inspection report forms, a root cause analysis, corrective and preventive actions, and supporting information: photographs, procedures, work orders, receipts. The root cause analysis carries the most weight. RightShip describes a good one as clear, specific to the recorded finding, and focused on the system the operator controls; a poor one is "vague and incomplete" and, in RightShip's words, frequently results in recurring findings.
The stakes of a weak submission are spelled out in the same guidance: follow-up will always be required, vetting outcomes are delayed, and a deficiency closed with limited context can end up graded more severely than it deserved. This is where an evidence trail built before and during the inspection pays off. A close-out written from dated photos of the item, the fix and the verification reads differently from one reconstructed from memory three weeks later.
How does validity interact with the age trigger?
Validity is the clock; the age trigger is the alarm. Once a vessel is past the current threshold of RightShip's inspection age trigger, 11 years as of mid-2026, an acceptable inspection suppresses rule SS2-5 only while it remains valid. The day validity lapses, the rule returns and the Safety Score sits at 2 until the next acceptable inspection closes out.
RightShip's rules soften the edges slightly: a 15-day grace period applies where an inspection application predates the trigger date, and age rules are suppressed for up to 20 days from an inspection while the report processes, unless the result was unacceptable or carried more than 30 findings. Those are buffers, not a strategy. The strategy is the validity band itself: an operator who consistently earns 12 months instead of 6 halves the number of inspections an ageing ship must pass, and the way to earn 12 months is fewer findings and a close-out RightShip grades as good. Both are decided before the inspector boards.