The Sailors’ Society provides welfare support for merchant seafarers on board ship and in port

We are an international charity. We sustain a network of professionally trained Chaplains working as ship visitors in ports around the globe providing welfare support to merchant seafarers. Through this network we board ships arriving in port and extend our reach to thousands of seafarers each year to enhance their well-being. We are able to relieve their loneliness, isolation and sometimes distress, and we can assist them if they require help from one or more of our services.

Merchant seafarers are always at the very heart of our work. We listen and make sure their voices are heard and their troubles listened to and – where possible – acted upon.

We seek to provide higher standards in provision of seafarers’ welfare, and to relieve distress and financial hardship wherever it occurs. We strive to ensure that multinational merchant seafarers are treated fairly, positively and with respect and are not just the invisible and largely forgotten community that people mostly take for granted but upon whom we all unconsciously rely for so much of our daily life. We offer support to their family and relatives when disaster, piracy or personal tragedy occurs.

"The vision that inspires us is a world where the isolation of the merchant seafarer is replaced with a sense of belonging" - Robert Adams (CEO)