How does a "dry rate" work?

[VMC-on-top]

Not so much from the point of view of renting an aircraft on a dry rate but assume you have a group of 5 people and an aircraft which has fuel totaliser and is reasonably capable?

Assume person A wants to go flying, they find the aircraft half full of fuel but want to fly longer than half tanks, so they fill it up with fuel from the local field (which is expensive) and full speed to the destination. They return, having filled up again, this time with cheap fuel, and travel at a more leisurely pace (LOP) for the return journey.

The next time the aircraft goes out is with person B, sees that the tanks are half full but is only going out for a local flight, so doesn't fill it up at all?

etc etc.

How do you work out how much to charge person A who filled up with expensive fuel and who flew flat out outbound but fill up with cheap fuel inbound and flew LOP? And for person B, they didn't fill up at all, so are they charged fuel at the cheap rate (there is some still in the tanks, in theory) or are they charged at the more expensive rate?

The reason I ask is that it came up in a new group that we are planning to form in the next few months or so and the aircraft's performance could vary quite dramatically depending on whether its flown flat out (say 60 litres / hour) or LOP, say 40 litres / hour?

It seems to be an admin nightmare! The two obvious answers are (a) charge a wet rate, which is hugely unfair on those flying LOP and filling up with cheap fuel or (b) charge a fixed fuel rate per litre and just use that as the basis for calculating litres used? - but again, it doesn't take into account fuel cost, so those who fly to say, the Channel Islands, regularly, get no benefit of the cheap fuel?

Is there any fair way of doing this?

[RTN11]

Surely you would have to enforce a policy that the aircraft is always topped up to the same level when it is finished with. That way, if person B turns up to find it below that level, he tops it up and sends the bill to the last person who flew it.

It's the only was a dry rate could work without a lot of guesswork on who has to put however much money in.

How many people are you intending to have in the group?

[VMC-on-top]

4 or 5 in the group, max. Re topping up the tanks upon return, in theory that works, just that fuel at our home base is about the most expensive in the UK!

[Julian]

We operate our group on a dry rate basis, the aircraft is always topped upto tabs on landing. If you land after hours and everything shut up, you call next morning, get it topped up and pay over the phone so ready for next person.

Dry rate def way to go.

J.

[VMC-on-top]

So what happens if you return and you are over tabs? Do you "gift" that fuel to the next person?

[Julian]

Never had that happen yet in 7 years in the group and cant see how you would unless you topped up past tabs and then didnt go flying.

[IO540]

I used to rent out my TB20, years ago, dry.

It works provided that

- you have an accurate flow totaliser
- the fuel totaliser is always accurately preloaded with the FOB (easy if you always fill right up, which with a TB20 you usually do)
- nobody fiddles (fraudulently) with the FOB value
- one person is in charge of the invoicing
- each pilot reports the FOB reading before/after his flight, to the above person

Then it is pretty simple. The man in charge invoices each pilot for the hourly rate plus the fuel cost. If a particular pilot flies for an hour at 40 litres/hr then he will obviously get a smaller invoice than another pilot who flew for an hour at 60 litres/hr.

Normally you have an account at the local airfield fuel pump, and most filling will be done there.

If somebody fills up away from base, and pays for it themselves, then you have to make an appropriate adjustment.

One trick which caught me out was how to handle the duty drawback. In some shared-aircraft arrangements you get one individual who just happens to like flying the shortest possible foreign trip every time :) If he is allowed to pocket the DD for himself, he will likely get totally free flying, at everybody else's expense. I had two renters (both being instructors) do this little con. There is no clearly fair way (to all) to deal with this which is also simple. I put in a scheme whereby I claimed back the drawback and then all those people flying afterwards got the benefit through lower fuel invoices, until the DD'd fuel was exhausted. Note that this issue is present in any group arrangement.

The advantage of dry rental is that it removes the common stupidity which you see all around airfields where the renter does everything he can (including power checks with a cold engine) before releasing the brakes and then races to the takeoff point.

The disadvantage of dry rental is the greater accounting issues, and having to trust people to not fiddle with the fuel totaliser (which one of my "instructor" renters did, not realising he would get caught by the EDM700 logs).

I gave up on all this hassle after a few years. Not enough quality customers.

Obviously forgetting about the totaliser and just filling to the brim (or tabs) is simple enough.

[dublinpilot]

Then it is pretty simple. The man in charge invoices each pilot for the hourly rate plus the fuel cost. If a particular pilot flies for an hour at 40 litres/hr then he will obviously get a smaller invoice than another pilot who flew for an hour at 60 litres/hr.


I imagine that invoicing in arrears also has a significant admin cost, and probably eventually a financial loss, where getting money out of people a few days/weeks after they have flown is much harder than getting it on the day that they've flown.

If they can't work out their own bill on the day and arrange for payment then, then I reckon it's only a matter of time before you get stung, and even if you don't you'll send a lot of time making reminder phone calls.

dp

[IO540]

Yes; I agree.

But if you can't trust the group members to pay up, you can't trust them to not fiddle with the fuel totaliser.

I suppose not having a fuel account at the airport will force every pilot to pay for the fuel he has used up. That's simple enough.

[englishal]

We just charge ourselves £100 per hour wet, and have an account at the airfield. Whenever we fill up with fuel, we do it on the account. If one of us fills up away from base, we just knock the cost of the fuel off the £100 per hour (i.e. put it down as an expense against the flying costs account). If fuel price varies, then so be it, you win some and lose some, who cares about a few quid here and there it will work itself out eventually.

Anyway there is just two of us in the group so it is easy to manage. When I was in a group at Bournemouth we had to fill back to tabs and pay for the fuel ourselves. The problem with this is that one man's tabs is not quite another man's tabs and even if it is short by 5 litres (which is barely noticable) that is almost £10 these days, and you do get characters like that in aviation (tight arses).