Palau (Belau) - Clearance
Visiting yachts should be aware that Foreign Vessel Water taxes were increased in September 2021 and are significantly higher than previously charged. See the Fees section for more information. Local residents cruisers continue in their efforts to try and get these rolled back.
Palau Pre-Arrival Procedures for Yachts
ALL vessels (including sailing vessels) have a number of pre-arrival notifications to make before arriving in Palau. It is important that skippers follow the rules to avoid difficulties.
1. Notifications to the Port Captain
ALL vessels (including sailing vessels) calling into Palau shall make notifications 72, 24 and 12 hours prior to arrival, direct to the Bureau of Marine Transportation (i.e. the Port Captain) at PLWarrivalnotice@gmail.com. The 72 hour notification shall include a list of the last 10 ports visited.
2. “Application to Enter” for Customs and Immigration
ALL vessels (including sailing vessels) must complete an Application for Non-Scheduled Vessel to Enter the Republic of Palau, and submit it no less than 48 hours before the estimated time of arrival (ETA). No vessel can enter the Republic of Palau without having been issued an appropriate entry permit. Fines may be imposed if the rules are not followed.
3. Online Entry Form for Travelers
Each crew member (or family) must use the digital/online entry form for travelers as well (submitted within 72 hours of arrival, or before departure for Palau). Go to https://palautravel.pw/. A copy of the completed form, or unique QR code, must be presented to Immigration on arrival.
These two forms (2 & 3) are both required for all Cruising Yachts intending to enter Palau.
Other actions:
Prepare an itemized inventory of ship’s stores for review by Quarantine. Dispose of any organic trash properly before arriving in Palau. Quarantine may confiscate for incineration any organic trash, fresh foodstuffs and any meats of concern to them. There is an incineration charge in Palau for any confiscated trash. See Fees.
Notes:
- The Royal Belau Yacht Club (RBYC)/Sam’s Tours, are not approved agents, and can no longer assist yachts with entry formalities. The RBYC will continue to welcome cruisers following their official entry into Palau.
- An advance permit is no longer required, nor is it mandatory to use an agent to facilitate entry. This requirement was removed in March 2023.
Palau Arrival Procedures for Yachts
Ports of Entry:
A yacht may not stop at any other place before clearing in at Malakal, the Port of Entry, unless the Chief of Immigration grants permission, if it is in the public interest of that place or an emergency situation.
Anchoring before clearing-in is prohibited. However, a yacht in distress may anchor or land at any port in Palau, but must immediately notify the nearest government official to contact the Chief of Immigration. Yachts stopping anywhere else other than Malakal will be instructed to proceed to Malakal immediately. It is very important to keep in touch with the Authorities.
Do not enter the harbour in the dark or in poor conditions, as paper and electronic charts are not accurate for Palau.
General Clearance Process:
- Yachts must check-in immediately on arrival at the commercial dock on the east side of Malakal Harbour, GPS position: 07° 19.84′ N , 134° 27.48′ E.
- Arriving vessels must contact Palau Port Control on VHF Channel 16 before mooring at the Commercial Dock.
- No crew, other than the Skipper, is permitted to disembark from the vessel until an Entry Permit has been granted.
- Entry permits will only be issued by Immigration Monday – Friday from 8:00am – 5:00pm (excluding holidays).
- The Skipper will be required to complete a Small Craft Arrival Report. See Biosecurity for details of items that must be declared and prohibited items.
- Quarantine may confiscate for incineration any organic trash, fresh foodstuffs and any meats of concern to them. There is an incineration charge for any confiscated trash.
- Palau is now employing US-trained canines to inspect arriving yachts/vessels. Presumably for drugs and weapons.
Be prepared for lots of Government officials to participate in the clearance of your vessel. Officials are generally very courteous and polite, but there’s just rather a lot of them – including: Customs, Immigration, Sanitation, Quarantine, Transportation, Health Dept, Public Safety (Police), and possibly a few others.
Once crew and yacht are cleared in, a Vessel Entry Permit valid for 30 days, will be issued at Immigration during business hours (see Customs for more details). Immigration issues Vessel Entry Permits after crew visas (see Immigration for details) and it may take several days and require a visit to the Immigration office. Extension of Vessel Entry Permits may be granted on application, provided you meet the eligiblity requirements and you have the appropriate visa.
If arriving outside normal hours (Monday – Friday from 8:00am – 5:00pm (excluding holidays)) expect to pay an overtime fee of about $40 for each official. Clearance is reported to be simple and completed in 15 – 20 minutes. See the Fees section for full details of what fees you can expect to pay.
Palau Departure Procedures for Yachts
- Forty-Eight (48) hours notice is required before departure.
- Contact the Department of Transportation to inform them of your pending departure.
- To avoid any delays, the skipper must notify Customs and Immigration of any changes to the already transmitted Entry Form.
- Customs and Immigration officials will meet you on departure day at an agreed place and time.
- A departure fee is no longer being charged.
The Bureau of Marine Transportation shall not grant departure clearance to any foreign water vessel unless the person having charge of the said water vessel, or its agent, provides original proof of payment of the Foreign Water Vessel Tax or Foreign Water Vessel Fee. Violation of these Regulations shall be subject to a fine of up to $50,000, and the vessel shall be subject to seizure.
Last updated: September 2024
If you have information for this section, or feedback on businesses used, please let us know at editor@noonsite.com. We also welcome new information about businesses you have used (see Related Businesses).
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Related to following destinations: Palau (Belau)
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The FEES link does not go to a new page — can someone direct me to a page that lists the entry fees for Palau?
Hi Sue, thanks for notifying us of the lost link, we’ll fix it. All formalities sections are found via the list icon in the blue bar at the top of the page. This also takes you to ports and lots of other useful info. so have a click on each one to find out more.
Palau is now open to private yachts All persons aboard must be vaccinated and tested. See The Covid Information section for all the details.
Entry fees have not changed and are still the highest in the entire Indo-Pacific.
April 1st 2020, as of today the Port of Palau is closed to arriving private sailing vessels until further notice. Local sailing vessels may depart and return after a 14 day quarantine period.
Palau update 26 March 2020. We just wanted to post an update about what’s happening here in Palau with the Covid19 outbreak.
As of today there are no confirmed cases. No general quarantine, no lock down, people are free to move about, new arrivals via sea or air are subject to a 14-day quaranteen period. Several hotels are providing secure quaranteen facilities to the Government, for any new arrivals. Air travel is virtually at a halt with all the international airlines having dropped their service to Palau. A solitary UA weekly flight to Guam is all that is scheduled. The Island Hooper has one flight scheduled In April.
Many businesses related to tourism, are closing, closed, or scaling down, including dive ops, restaurants and hotels. There are few tourists left in Palau. Many expats who worked in these industries have also departed for their home countries.
Palauans are observing common sense social distance rules, limiting public gatherings and schools are closed. Medical facilities are in an enhanced state of readiness, having had time to prepare.
Of specific interest to us yachties, there are no new restrictions to our movement about the Palau islands, still subject to having the usual paid permits. The stores are full of fresh provisions. Sea freight is still arriving on schedule. The US Mail is still being delivered to the Koror Post Office. All goods and services are open and available. The Rock Islands are even more beautiful, but sadly empty of dive and tour boats, with the exception of few super yachts.
As of November 2019 the new Palau entry charges (see Customs) have now been law more than 60 days. They appear to be enforced according to the official schedule of fees. The very few cruising yachts that have arrived since the new laws/fees went into effect report they were charged the published fees. Of these few cruisers, they either stayed for or are planning to stay less than 30 days. With the new much higher fees in place, it is likely that few cruising yachts will call here or stay longer than 30 days.
Such a shame. We wanted to spend a couple of months there, but the new charges have put it out of the picture for us.
Palau (https://www.palaugov.pw/) has posted the “official” wording of a new law, RPPL No. 10-38: Classification for Yachts and Cruise Ships, which has impacts ($$$ & length of stay) to private cruising yachts. The new law goes into effect 90 days from its signing date of 11 June 2019. If you desire to know more a copy of the new law is at: https://www.palaugov.pw/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/RPPL-No.-10-38-re.-To-Amend-Section-1405-of-Title-40.pdf
We stopped in Palau after leaving Indonesia on our way to Japan and had nothing short of a fantastic experience with the officials and the locals. We arrived on a Saturday and paid an extra $40 to each official for overtime, but they were all waiting on the dock for us and we were cleared in after about 15 minutes…simple. The Customs officer gave me a card with his personal cell phone number and told me to call him if I had any trouble with the spare parts I was expected to arrive by air. I tried to tip the security person at the quarantine dock who helped us tie up and he refused saying they cannot do that in Palau and we were never asked for money by anyone.
Anyone stopping in Palau can contact Sam at Sam’s Tours ahead of time at rbycpalau@gmail.com and he will notify the officials of your arrival date and time and that’s a free service. Sam is the local cruiser resource who will find or do just about anything to make your trip there fantastic. He runs a dive operation and a bar/restaurant and marina/fuel dock with moorings. By paying $50 to join RBYC, Royal Belau Yacht Club, you become a member of the group and it’s the best $50 you will spend. Buy Sam a beer and you’ll get all the local knowledge your brain can absorb. There is another marina in Koror, Palau that we suggest you avoid as it is not “cruiser friendly”. And have the onion rings at Sam’s bar, they are the best. Lastly, Petris runs a taxi on the island and charges cruisers half price. His local cell phone number is 776-1715. He’s a very nice man who knows his way around the island and will pick you up at Sam’s.
Stan MV Buffalo Nickel
Feb 27, 2019 10:02 PM
We hear you and were considering prior to reading your post stopping there on our way to the Philippines (Puerta Princesa) Now we are going to dig deeper for more input. Im so sorry you experienced that on your journey. It is unfortunate and we greatly appreciate your input as it weighs in on travel decisions when you are sailing on a budget. S/V Seagate (Instagram-isleofhope) Thank you Sue 🙂
Posted on behalf of SY Segue:
We came to Indonesia from Palau. What a REFRESHING change. We truly felt that Palau was one HUGE money grab. Every single official needed money. Money to the dock guy that grabs your lines.
Money to Customs. Money to Immigration. Money to BioSecurity. Money just to anchor in the port. Money to go cruising… Every single government official had their hands out for money.
Heck — it’s even $50 bucks a head to LEAVE Palau — some “Green Tax”… All told it cost us THOUSANDS of dollars to be in Palau for three months.