Training Costs

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

I am an instructor at the Hastings District Flying Club in Port Macquarie. Recently we revised our charges for flying instruction to the following:

 

Flying Instruction $40 p/hr

 

Formal pre flight briefings $20 p/hr

 

Theory instruction $30 p/hr (e.g.BAK, Navigation)

 

Test fee in addition to flying time. $50

 

Q1. Do you think this is in the ball park?

 

Q2. We do not charge anything for supervise solo. Should there be a charge for this?

 

 

[Guest David C]

Do you charge $40/hr training rate in addition to the hourly hire rate , if not then I assume you have made a typo and really mean $140/hr total .??

 

Not sure whether your figures are ball park , however I did not pay a test fee in addition to flying time at my training school . I relation to your second question , I take it you charge solo rate for supervised solo , if that is correct , then I think you would be justified in charging a training rate .

 

Your rates should probably reflect the type of aircraft you train on , what type do you use for training ??

 

Dave C

 

 

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

Hi Dave,

 

The $40 is in addition to the private hire rate of $95 per hour for our Foxbat A22. i.e. $135 dual.

 

We have adjusted the fees to make it more attractive for our part time instructors to do a bit more. Our instructors have local businesses and are reluctant to do too much flying training as it takes them away from their bread and butter source.

 

Chris,

 

I too have never paid for pre flight briefing as a student but from looking around other schools I see this is coming more in to vogue. A part time instructor has to devote two hours away from his/her normal job/business to do flying training and it is sometimes hard to justify for $40. (As much as we love to do it) With regard to supervised solo. We didn't make a charge for that but I see a lot of schools do as the instructor can't leave while the student is on a local area solo for example.

 

 

[poteroo]

Supervised solo is exactly that - the instructor must be able to see the student doing their circuits. This means the instructor cannot be briefing, or flying, or elsewhere.

 

Some GA schools pay instructors 50% of the award rate for (the grade of instructor) doing the supervision, and so need to charge more than private hire. Some charge out at 'dual' rates - on the basis the instructor is unable to conduct income earning activities while visually 'supervising'.

 

In any case, watching the students performance can be quite instructive for the instructor, and at remote locations, a few brief comments by handheld radio can be very useful to the student.

 

Personally, I don't like a long list of 'add-ons' to training charges. If the dual rate is pitched correctly, then there is enough in the payment to cover pre-flight and post-flight briefings. If the student wants to attend a seperate theory course - then that's done apart from the flying activities of the day.

 

happy days,

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Here in Mackay, we get charged a fixed rate for flight instruction. For the gazelle that is $170 per hour, since it is being maintained by a LAME and has a VH reg, but even though they are re-registering with RAAus soon, the cost is still gonna be the same.

 

As far as I know, we don't get charged for any exams that we sit.

 

All we get charged for is when we demand the full attention of an instructor, in other words, if the phone rings, he doesn't answer! ;)

 

So, we get charged $170/h, supervised solo is the same, private hire works out to be around $140/h, we don't get charged for formal or informal briefings and can come in any time and ask for help with the theory (we have correspondence textbooks) and not be charged either.

 

The instructors also fly charters, which adds a bit to their income, but, if weight and passenger numbers allow, a student can fly with at no charge, which is also extremely nice. :big_grin:

 

 

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

Wow!! $170/h for a Gazelle. I understand there is more cost in maintaining it as a GA machine but, ...wow!

 

I think that when the Gazelle changes to "24-" rego the price would have to come down otherwise it would be the most expensive RA-Aus Gazelle in the country. (I spose I could be wrong about that though).

 

We welcome students (and anyone else for that matter) just to call in and have a chat about how they're going. Asking for help and discussing specific points of theory etc is obviously not charged. The charges relate to structured theory or briefings.

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Yeah, it is a bit on the steep side when you look at what others charge, but I think what they might have done, I am not sure though, is include small portions of fees for your tests, so say they have an average time to solo tests or BAK tests, each of these tests costs say $30 each, so if you were to get to these tests at 10 hours, then you need to add $6 per hour onto the charge of a lesson, then maybe some on top of that for briefings, say $10, then the hugely expensive price of aircraft maintenance charged by the monopoly holding company here in Mackay and you might end up around the $170 mark. :;)1:

 

Also, it doesn't get too busy with the gazelle either, it is mostly flown on the weekends, and then maybe only for 8 hours on the weekend, it doesn't get too much flight time during the week.

 

Hopefully now that the school is becoming an FTF the gazelle might get more time. Then add to that, that it is possible that the school gets a CASA exemption allowing solo training in CTA airspace under the supervision of the flight school, then it is going to get a lot of flight time. The only real condition place upon this exemption is that the student hold a class 2 medical, which kind of defeats the object. :P

 

 

[Admin]

I know about 3 years ago - if my memory serves me - that Penfield here in Melb were charging $140 per hour for the Gazelle which only included 45mins of flying and 15mins of briefing. That would equate to $186.66 per hour flying time (as most other schools only charge for flying time and briefing is free) and that was 3 years ago. That is why I went to Point Cook and then later to Shepparton who at the same time were only charging $129 per hour of flying.

 

I don't know what Penfield charge now though!

 

 

[Guest pelorus32]

Bluntly $170/hr for a Gazelle and $140 solo is over the top.

 

One of the key variable costs in aircraft hire is the capital cost. A Gazelle is cheaper than many other aircraft that are hired out at much lower costs.

 

Take the Tecnam I fly - $108 solo, $118 supervised solo and $158 dual.

 

Those aircraft (2 going on 3) probably cost in the order of $130-140K each to put online. They are 12 and 6 months old respectively. And they're LAME maintained. What is the capital cost of a Gazelle? It's probably depreciated to zero if it's been around a while.

 

Most of the other costs are not so variable.

 

Seems high to me!

 

Mike

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Mike, I agree with you completely, it did seem odd that moving down from a Cessna 172 ($200/hr) to a Gazelle was only a $30 difference. There isn't much I can do about it though. Horizon is the only flight school up here in Mackay AFAIK.

 

I wish I could be charged those rates you have, I would be able to fit close to 1.5 flight hours into a lesson with $170.

 

Edit:

 

Ohh, one small vital piece of information I forgot to mention. The school doesn't own the Gazelle, they have it on lease from someone down in Brisbane. So maybe that is what is going on. I heard my CFI mention that they are charged over the top by this guy, and then Horizon still has to take care of maintenance costs.

 

 

[Admin]

Lamiunto - I found when I went to Shepparton for example that I could stay in the caravan park opposite the airstrip and doing 2 to 3 lessons a day the caravan park was paid for by the money I saved whilst I was able to concentrate on getting my Certificate in the shortest period of time without the family commitments - it was great and I also saved by having focused regular training so I wasn't taking 2 steps forward and 1 back by having lessons a week or two apart.

 

 

[BigPete]

I did my flight training with Cliff Banks (Swan Hill).

 

Cliff flys to Echuca every second Friday and stays 'till Saturday afternoon and then returns to Swan Hill. The next week he goes to Wentworth.

 

I think his current charges are $130/140 an hour. Thats 'tacho time in the Jabiru J170c. Solo under supervision is the same.

 

Everything else is FREE. Exams, pre-flight and post-flight briefings etc etc.

 

I took around 30 hours to gain my certificate. I never felt that it was costing too much to learn. This made for very relaxed learning experience with lots of time for explanations and flying theory.

 

I doubt whether I would have enjoyed it as much while being under financial pressure of 170 an hour for flight time as well as paying for all briefings and the like.

 

Cliff does have a huge advantage - as he is a "one man show" - does all his own servicing and repairs. We try and look after him as much as we can.

 

regards

 

 

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

Lamiunto, was $200/hr for the C172 the dual rate? I hope so. Our club owns a 172N and we offer it to our members at $140 private hire.

 

Back to the RA-Aus scene, I'm concerned that there may be some opportunistic operators out there that are steadily increasing prices to a point where there is not a lot of difference between the training rates for RA-Aus and GA. We cannot get to a situation where the only reason we can say that RA is more affordable is by virture of the fact that it is a 20 course, being half that of the GA guys. (and as we know 20 hrs is the bare minimum and most students take many additional hours)

 

GA rates are what they are because of the extra costs involved in complying with CASA's complex rules. The RA operators that choose to have their aeroplanes LAME maintained should be looking for an experienced L2 instead.

 

RA-Aus is looking at implementing various new endorsements etc which without knowing the details look very GA-ish. I hope we don't become the organisation that started out by keeping flying cheap (and safe) but end up as a GA type operation under another name.

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Ian, that sounds like it was great. I would love to do something like that, take maybe a week off, fly at every chance I get and be done with a certificate. The problem is, I am living the student life, so it is not much of an option for me at the moment. One flight per week is doing pretty good, then I have the luxury of a very good PC, to run FS2004 on almost full graphics and then I have full realism settings. So I practice circuits, glides etc... in there. I do it in the C172 though, but I try to focus on the principle of what I am doing, rather than how to do it in the cessna.

 

Pete, luckily I am charged per tacho hour as well. I also don't pay for briefings or any tests (so far), but I agree, having to watch your flight time while up in the air to make sure you don't spend too much money is not how you are supposed to learn to fly. Especially when you need to get something perfected, like gliding approaches in my case.

 

Adam, you are 100% correct. It seems that some FTF's are realising just how many people out there would rather go for a rec. certificate, saving some money and not having to deal with CASA too much, so they decide to charge GA rates for RAA instruction, it is a real pity. Hopefully someone somewhere has the courage to take them on and try to fix the problem before it gets out of hand. (I don't have the guts :black_eye:)

 

Maybe we should buy a huge plot of land up here in Mackay and start an air park, we only need to be more than 6nm from the airport to be out of the controlled airspace steps. DLL is at 1000ft, then the further you go, the higher it gets, everything below is uncontrolled.

 

 

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

Shaun, a little birdy has told me that there are a couple of influential forum members who are considering running for RA-Aus board positions. If they get there we can hopefully do a lot more in making sure RA costs don't get out of hand.

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Shaun, a little birdy has told me that there are a couple of influential forum members who are considering running for RA-Aus board positions. If they get there we can hopefully do a lot more in making sure RA costs don't get out of hand.

I hope it works out that way, it would be great. :big_grin:

 

So, has this thread helped you in your survey on instruction costs?

 

 

[Guest Booker YPMQ]

I hope it works out that way, it would be great. :big_grin:So, has this thread helped you in your survey on instruction costs?

It has sort of helped. 1. I think our school prices don't require changing at this time. 2. There is definately no consistency in what students pay. Good for some and bad for others I guess.

 

 

[Lamiunto]

It has sort of helped. 1. I think our school prices don't require changing at this time. 2. There is definately no consistency in what students pay. Good for some and bad for others I guess.

Yeah, I guess it all really comes down to the individual needs of your flight school. If you have 4 instructors on your payroll (like here at Horizon) then your fees might need to be a bit higher, add to that hangar costs at an RPT airport, and then all the other factors that are also not really regulated, such as airport fees and such, and you will end up with an hourly charge that either makes you break-even or get a bit of profit out of it.

 

I do agree though, we need some sort of industry standard when it comes to what students are being charged.

 

 

[Guest pelorus32]

I do agree though, we need some sort of industry standard when it comes to what students are being charged.

Ahhh,

 

now that's something that you cannot do!! That's anti-competitive and might well sound like price-fixing. The ACCC might want to know about that!

 

The best that you can hope for is that market forces work. As Tony has pointed out often enough you should be looking at the total value that you get for your "hour" of flying. All I would say is that you need to be getting value elsewhere in the training system if you are paying a higher hourly rate. If you are paying higher across the board then that's a problem.

 

Regards

 

Mike

 

 

[Admin]

The biggest problem I feel is that different schools have different running costs - some pay higher landing fees then others etc etc plus they all have different aircraft.

 

What I feel strong about and it is only my personal opinion is that we are losing the differentiation between cheaper recreational flying and that of GA. We are getting these great new rec aircraft that are costing $100k+ and for example the Tecnam now at about $140k that are used for teaching recreational flying which is really very nice to fly but GA are teaching in $40k aircraft so their aircraft return costs are minimised.

 

If it were back to similar apples like say a $40k Gazelle and a $40k C172 then the differentiation between the cheaper recreational lessons and GA lessons would be far greater again - after all, if say the difference between rec flying in a Tecnam and GA flying in a 152 or 172 ends up only say $10 to $15 difference then we lose our advantage that the student sees. Remember a student sees the dollars first as they're not a seasoned rec flyer yet.

 

Schools that go for the higher priced aircraft we must also remember that it is their choice based on their market and they make their own best informed decision - that is the great thing about this industry.

 

Just my thoughts and they are strong thoughts for the betterment of flying recreationally then for GA - we have more fun! ;)

 

Addendum:

 

It wasn't that long ago that in GA a student would learn to fly in say a 152 and when trained if they wanted their own aircraft they would buy a 172 or so - the point here is that they started on shall we say a Gazelle and once trained bought a Technam etc.

 

This week I have heard of 2 separate schools - 1 that had Gazelles, went and got a Tecnam and now are getting rid of it and going back to a Gazelle. The other school has a Texan, they are now looking at getting rid of the Texan and getting a Gazelle.

 

Before another school I know of got rid of their Gazelles they were charging them out at $139 (dual) after just going up from $129 and then went to Technams that are charged out at about $160

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Mike, I understand exactly what you are saying. I am probably just having one of those rambling student moments.

 

Ian, I agree 100%. It seems though, that flight schools see a brand new ultralight aircraft for $150k, and then see a brand new C172 for over $250k, and then take the ultralight because it is $100k cheaper, and is legal in both the RAA and VH registers. The problem doesn't end at the flight schools though, the manufacturers are always adding "bonuses" to push the price up, sometimes it's an all glass cockpit, or a recovery chute, the list goes on and on, and there is an added $10k here, some $20k there, and so on. I would think that flight schools would rather just get the standard analogue cockpits, which is best for students in my opinion anyway. The J160's are going for $74k last I saw, so I wonder why FTF's aren't snapping them up. :;)4:

 

 

[Yenn]

It looks as if the mindset behind flight schools is charge whatever the market will bear. That is a pity and also short sighted, because the less people who learn to fly, the less pilots there are to hire planes in the future. With the high cost of learning I think probably the best method would be for students to buy their own basic plane and hire an instructor.

 

 

[Guest brentc]

Ian is right about the different schools and their running costs.

 

If my flight training facility put their price up from $160 to $170 an hour, however it meant that they will remain open (keep in business) and I can fly with the same instructor with the same 'as new' and well maintainted aircraft, I'll pay that price.

 

Often as has been noted, the school gets their aircraft from another location and operates it on-line, then adds their bit for the instructor etc, so often a school's hands are tied so to speak because they may have little or no control over the aircraft that they have available. It would be a little much to expect a school (particularly a one-man-operator) to buy two or more new Tecnams at $140k each!

 

If it cost you $10 an hour more at $170 versus $160 for example, that's only $300 over the cost of your entire certificate which may have taken 6 months or more. Like I said, if it means that your school can continue to operate by raising prices then you have to pay.

 

Personally I'd be more concerned about schools stringing you along and telling you that you are not yet ready to go solo or to obtain your certificate. In a mere couple of hours extra time required, there goes any saving that you made by finding a cheaper hourly rate.

 

When I learnt at Sunbury, I paid by the VDO and flights included a pre-flight theory session as 'most' schools do. Theory is usually always charged seperate for those that need it. You need to not get that bit confused. Tooradin charges a flat hourly fee which includes the pre-flight briefing.

 

I've also flown at schools that load up prices for shorter flights, so .5 @ $160 per hour is not actually $80, it's $90. So if I do .5 in the morning and .5 in the afternoon it might cost me $180, versus $160. Pretty sneaky.

 

Generally schools only charge the 'supervised solo' rate for around 2-3 hours.

 

I also see this discussion headed towards the difference between GA registered and Level 2 registered and maintained. In realistic terms, if the maintenance is performed correctly as per manufacturer guidelines the costs should be near identical so the hiring cost should be similar.

 

Mike - I'm amazed that the Tecnam is $108! That would have to be the cheapest anywhere. I personally wonder how long that will last at that rate. Jabiru put their running costs at near $90 an hour and they only cost around $80k, so I'm not sure how anyone could operate a $130k'ish Tecnam for $108. Only time will tell.

 

 

[Admin]

Just had a funny thought - imagine a GA school training students for their PPL in a VH registered Gazelle - would that mean that PPL GA training could be as low as say $130 an hour - that would put the cat amongst the pigeons ;)

 

 

[Lamiunto]

Just had a funny thought - imagine a GA school training students for their PPL in a VH registered Gazelle - would that mean that PPL GA training could be as low as say $130 an hour - that would put the cat amongst the pigeons ;)

Haha, yeah, it would be weird. Weirder still, I am training in a VH registered Gazelle. ;)

 

I am their first RAA student, up until now, almost 20 students have gone through to their PPL while training mostly in that same Gazelle.