bartolini vs. ventum
I did part of my training at Bartolini in Lodz and part at Ventum in Warsaw. These are my observations:
- @ Bartolini instructors are experienced (most with thousands of flight hours) whereas @ Ventum there is quite a lot of young, many with restricted FI(A) license;
- @ Bartolini you get thorough help with theory problems you face whereas @Ventum your questions are either left with no answer or explained briefly; nevertheless, if you want to pass ATPL exams, you have to learn a lot on your own and (the best way) subscribe to one of the on-line CQs - I can recommend you bistol, e-atpl or aviationexam;
- when you book a flight @ Bartolini for a specific time, most of the time the plane is ready for you when that time comes, @ Ventum you rarely fly at the booked time;
- everybody @ Bartolini is ready to help you with any normal life problems you face when you live in a foreign country; I didn't have the same feeling @ Ventum;
- EPLL (where Bartolini flies) is a controlled airport with an ILS - you practice flying at a controlled airport from the first start; at Lodz Tower all controllers speak English very well; if you need to do your IR training you can practice twice as many approaches as you would do @ Ventum;
- EPBC (where Ventum is located) is not a controlled airport - at Babice Info most controllers speak English very poor... sometimes I wonder how do they pass those language tests?! you don't feel too comfortable when the controller on the other side makes you repeat few times before he understands what you say; what's more, for every IR training flight @ Ventum, you have to count over 30 minutes one way to get to the closest airport with ILS at which you can practice ILS approaches, that is EPLL; yes, EPWA is closer but they rarely allow student IR flights;
- Bartolini owns their Tecnam P2006T, Ventum only leases theirs;
- accommodation in Lodz is cheaper than in Warsaw;
- as "matalice" wrote - there is an IKEA quite close to the Bartolini FTO - a 3 meal tasty course will really cost you 3-4EUR;
- flight time - Ventum counts your SE flight time as 1.15x what moto-hour-meter shows; @ Bartolini it is what "portos8" wrote; also you have to take into account that Bartolini is right by the EPLL runway whereas @ EPBC it takes few minutes before you taxi to the runway; for any training that requires flying the airport circuits - at EPLL the traffic pattern takes around 6 minutes because you fly really close to the airport, at EPBC it takes about 10 minutes because the pattern is organized in a way to go around a housing district; overall, it extends your PPL(A) training by at least 3-5h;
- I found commuting to EPLL much easier than to EPBC; moreover, at EPBC when you get out of tram (the only one that gets you close to the airport gate) you have to walk around 10 minutes to get to the hangar where Ventum is located; you can also commute by bus, but then you have to walk about 1km to get to the airport gate and another 1km to get to the hangar;
Captain Mainwaring - yes, you are right that Bartolini charges international students more, but it is not 15%; f.i. C152 for Polish speaking students - 490PLN, for others - 123EUR which at the actual rate is 502PLN - only 2% more; Tecnam P2006T - 1150PLN/290EUR = 1183PLN = <3% more; the difference is based on the exchange rate of PLN/EUR - currently it is 4.08PLN/EUR; at the time you wrote your post - 20/02/12 it was 4.18PLN/EUR which means they did charge 5% more; I paid much more at Ventum - it ranged up to 50% more than Poles paid;
that's pretty much what I observed when I trained at both schools; I'll write an update if I can think of anything else;
TOPIL-LPTA