Big Cheese,
Yes, you can take pax with a UK NPPL but your licence will only be valid in the United Kingdom, during daylight hours and in VFR conditions. You cannot add night or IMC ratings to an NPPL (nor can it be used as a foundation for a CPL or IR if you decide you want to do these modules).
You can, of course, upgrade your NPPL to a JAR-FCL PPL (the written exams are exactly the same, or they were when I was training not so long ago) and I believe you can count about 30 hours of your NPPL training towards your JAR-FCL licence. Thus, you'd need to do another 15 or so to get to the JAR minimum of 45.
I considered doing this myself at the start of my training, but finally decided to do the full JAR-FCL licence. One of the main reasons for this is that I had no desire to sit 2 separate skills tests (its actually 3 tests, because the NPPL test is broken down into Gen handling and Gen Navigation and I believe these are flown separately). Unfortunately, its not just a case of flying the extra 15 hours and "hey presto" you're done. You have to sit another skills test. If that doesn't bother you... or you intend to leave a couple of years between licenses.. then the NPPL might be a better option.
Another thing to consider. I know very well that at 32 hours of training I was NOT ready to be an (unsupervised) PIC with pax. I eventualy passed my JAR-FCL license on minimum hours. I dont claim to be a fantastic pilot (I believe I'm safe) and I am quite sure there are those out there with more ability than I have, but I do think you'd need to be an exceptional candidate to get through a flying license and pass in 32 hours.
I guess what Im saying is.. if you're going to spend more like 40/45 hours on passing an NPPL anyway (your INS will only put you in for a test when he/she thinks you are ready) it is probably worth doing the JAR-FCL course!
I am sure someone will correct me if I am wrong, but I thought the main reason for choosing an NPPL over the JAR-FCL course was inability to satisfy JAR medical requirements. So, if you can pass a class 2 medical, I'd advise you to stagger the cost of the course (I took a year over mine) and go for the JAR licence. Realisticly, if you do it in this country it could take you that long anyway, thanks to British weather. If you want to go to America, thats another matter all together, but remember that when you get back here, you'll have to get checked out with a club and be able to pay the British self-fly hire prices (which do NOT make good bed time reading).
One last thing. If your 20 hours were a few years ago and you haven't flown since, I would guess you might have to revise an awful lot of what you learnt back then. That alone will mean you would probably overshoot the 32 hour requirement for an NPPL.
Good luck whatever you decide!
V2
Last edited by veetwo; 15th August 2005 at 07:37.