Determination and Examination of Tanker Ship Management Company Selection Criteria in Turkiye According to Their Level of Importance

The maritime sector continues to exist as an area where density is high, and more changes occur every day. Shipowners are going through difficulties in operating their ships in terms of sectoral fluctuations and sustainability. Due to this difficulty, shipowners’ orientation towards the companies where they will operate their ships has increased. Although existing research has emphasized the importance of the increasing use of ship management companies and the identification of selection factors, the evaluation of selection criteria for tanker companies with specific ship types seems to be insufficient. In the study, the selection criteria that will support the critical decision-making process for tanker ship operating companies in Türkiye are evaluated using Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) method. It is aimed to identify the priority criteria for the selection of a Ship Management Company (SMC), for which 4 main criteria (’Experience and Reliability’, ‘Technological Infrastructure and Organization’, ‘Financial status’ and ‘Quality standards and Safe management system’) and 21 sub-criteria are identified and considered. This study contributes to the development of criteria that can be used in the selection of a ship management company depending on the ship type. In the study, experts with a minimum of 10 years of experience in tanker shipping companies, who are on active duty and at least in the position of operations manager, assisted in the determination and evaluation of the selection criteria of the ship operating companies. As a result of the study, the most important main criteria identified by the experts were experience and reliability. Among the sub-criteria, the most important preferences are ’Sectoral knowledge and expertise’, ’reputation and references’, ’personal cost’ and ’sustained performance’. The study contributes to the development of ship management company selection criteria by ship owners and identifies the areas that ship management companies need to improve their service standards.