It is October.
Somewhere in your office there may be a spreadsheet called 2027 Budget v3, and it probably looks quite a lot like 2026 Budget FINAL. That is understandable. With a deadline approaching and daily operations competing for attention, last year’s figures provide a reasonable starting point.
The difficulty comes when those figures carry forward assumptions that no longer reflect how your fleet operates. Changes in compliance obligations, maintenance requirements, and fleet structure can alter the costs ahead, while familiar processes continue consuming time and money without attracting much attention.
Before sign-off, it is worth asking whether your budget accounts for those changes—and whether it includes investment to improve how the costs are controlled.
EU ETS allowances surrendered in 2027 cover 100% of in-scope 2026 emissions, up from 70% for the previous reporting year. Methane and nitrous oxide also enter ETS scope for emissions from 2026.
FuelEU Maritime adds another consideration. Where a vessel’s greenhouse gas intensity exceeds the applicable limit, the financial outcome depends on how the compliance deficit is managed, including any use of pooling, banking or borrowing, and whether a penalty remains payable.
These costs depend on where your vessels trade, the energy they use and the contractual arrangements governing who pays. A single fleet-wide estimate can obscure both the exposure and the recovery expected from charterers.
Your budget should also distinguish between the cost associated with 2027 operations and the cash needed during 2027 to meet obligations from the previous reporting year. Allowance purchases, compliance deadlines and charterer recoveries may fall at different times.
Even where costs are allocated by vessel, central purchases, shared shore costs and late invoices can make the current position difficult to establish.
A fleet-level total may look reasonable while individual vessels face very different maintenance requirements or operating pressures. If those differences are difficult to see, they are also difficult to reflect in next year’s budget.
The useful question is how readily your team can explain each vessel’s costs, outstanding commitments, and emerging variances - and use that information when planning ahead.
Repeated data entry, vessel-to-office reconciliation, and reports assembled manually all consume time. Their cost is already included in salaries and overtime, but the amount of capacity they absorb is often less visible.
That matters when the fleet grows or reporting requirements increase. Teams may be expected to handle more work without a corresponding increase in resources, even though existing processes already stretch them.
Understanding where those hours go helps you assess whether additional headcount, better processes, or more connected systems would make the greatest difference.
A requirement identified late can mean an urgent purchase, expedited freight, and fewer options for scheduling the repair. Some disruption is unavoidable, but recurring emergency orders deserve a closer look.
Reviewing urgent spares, freight premiums, and maintenance overruns can help distinguish exceptional events from patterns that better planning could address.
Where maintenance and purchasing teams struggle to see the same requirements and commitments, the budget may be carrying a recurring cost that deserves an improvement plan.
A vessel joining under a new management contract, a sale, a new owning entity or another reporting currency can all create work beyond the vessel’s direct operating costs.
Systems need configuring, data needs checking or migrating, and people may need training. Reporting and approval processes may also need to change.
If your 2027 plans include changes to the fleet or company structure, make sure the budget includes the work needed to support them.
A first review can identify where the budget needs closer attention. Five checks provide a useful starting point.
Compare the proposal with your latest expected outturn.
Use year-to-date actuals, outstanding commitments and a forecast for the rest of 2026. Where next year’s allowance differs materially, record what explains the change.
Separate compliance exposure from cash timing.
Review the obligations payable during 2027 alongside the costs expected from 2027 operations. Include the assumptions behind allowance prices, FuelEU compliance arrangements and any recoveries from charterers.
Estimate the time consumed by recurring manual work.
Ask purchasing, finance and reporting teams where they spend time re-entering information, reconciling records or assembling reports. Use those estimates to understand capacity; hours released do not automatically become cash savings.
Review the cost of urgent work.
Look at emergency orders, expedited freight and unplanned maintenance. Identify recurring causes and where earlier visibility could give teams more options.
List the fleet and organisational changes already planned.
Include the systems, data, training and reporting work each change will require, with an owner and an allowance where possible.
The aim is to identify the assumptions that need validating and the improvements that deserve consideration before the budget is agreed.
As maritime operations become more digital, the question is increasingly how well the systems already in use work together. Maintenance, purchasing and finance may each have their own tools, yet teams can still spend hours transferring information between them and checking that the figures agree.
If those gaps are affecting your operation, the 2027 budget is an opportunity to plan an improvement. That might mean extending an existing system, connecting specialist applications or investing in a shared platform such as Shipnet.
Start with the outcomes you need: clearer vessel costs, better coordination between maintenance and purchasing, less duplicate entry or more timely reporting. Those priorities provide a basis for assessing the investment and asking suppliers to demonstrate how their software would support your operation.
The allowance should cover implementation as well as the software itself, including data migration, integrations, training and the time your own people will need to contribute. Agree how you will measure the result, distinguishing time released for other work from savings that will actually reduce expenditure.
If connected software could help address the gaps you have identified, including an allowance in the 2027 budget gives you room to evaluate the options properly and plan delivery around your fleet’s needs.
Our 2027 Fleet Budget Check provides a starting point for reviewing your assumptions and recording the gaps that need further investigation.
Use it alongside your current budget and the information you have available. You can complete an initial review, identify questions for colleagues, and build a clearer picture as the answers come in. No email address is required.
Download the 2027 Fleet Budget Check
If the review identifies an issue you would like to discuss - such as limited visibility of vessel costs, repeated reconciliation, or a gap between maintenance planning and purchasing - we would be happy to explore it with you.
Shipnet connects operational and financial information across maintenance, procurement, and finance, helping teams understand vessel costs and act on the same information. We can discuss the outcomes you want to achieve, what an implementation would involve, and the investment you would need to consider for your 2027 plans.
Danny James
Marketing Manager