I received the following rhetoric from CASA in response to my protest on the new medical fee hike.
I have added my opinion on a few of the points marked by ((((())))) - couldn't get font colour to change to make it easier!
Am I way off and on my own with my responses? Keen to know.
It reads:
Dear xxxxx
From 1 January 2006, a suite of new and increased charges apply to Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) regulatory services, with many charged at hourly rate to reflect the work required of CASA.
The change in fees follows the Australian Government’s decision on funding levels for CASA as part of a Long Term Funding Strategy (LTFS) that aims to deliver sustainable funding arrangements and certainty for both the aviation safety regulator and industry. Even after the new charges take effect, direct cost recovery will only contribute a small share of CASA’s total income – from around 5 per cent in 2004-05 to nine per cent this financial year and to around sixteen per cent in 2008-09. Fee income is to gradually rise from $5 million in 2004-05 to $10.5 million in 2005-06 and eventually to $20 million in 2008-09, being partially offset by a $5 million fall in fuel excise in 2008-09.
CASA’s cost recovery is designed to partially or fully recover the costs of providing consumer based services and activities as opposed to a flat tax or levy which are set independently of the cost of provision. Some of the guiding principles include only implementing cost recovery when it is cost effective to do so and ensuring that charges only relate to the costs of providing the services, rather than indirect costs such as policy functions.
One of the new fees is for medical certification. There is a fixed fee of $130 for the processing and consideration of an application for the issue or renewal of a medical certificate. This figure represents an average of an hour's work by CASA on this task, and as for the CASA hourly rate, includes all overheads associated with the provision of an hour's labour by CASA.
(((((The cost for my medical was $90. So it takes longer to review medical results than it does to conduct the medical itself, or you consider your staff can justify charging more per hour than my GP? I’d love to know their credentials. Are your staff Specialists?)))))
In many cases, the assessment of a medical certificate application and the production of the certificate for an applicant who meets the medical standard will take less than an hour. However, there is a reasonable proportion of applicants for medical certificates who do not meet the medical standard and need case management. These harder cases take considerably longer than an hour to deal with, and consequently increase the amount of time taken by CASA to assess medical certificate applications when averaged over all medical certificates issued by CASA.
(((((So to work this out, based on roughly 33,000 pilots in Australia, medicals take you 33,000 hours to process on average, equaling 4,400 x 7.5hr days, equaling 880 working weeks, equaling over 18 years of work for one person to manage. Any chance you are over inflating the average processing time on this or do you have a production line of dedicated staff working night and day?))))))
In determining how much to charge for medical certificates, whether by a fixed fee or an hourly fee per application, in the interests of equity and consistent with its treatment of other individual licences and certificates, CASA decided on setting a fixed fee payable by all applicants, regardless of the complexity of an application. Also, a fixed fee is simple to apply for the applicant and CASA, which helps to minimise the administration costs. The alternative of charging an hourly rate would mean that applicants who do not meet the medical standard would be forced to pay fees considerably in excess of the $130 flat fee.
(((((So? And if I invest a lot of time and money keeping myself fit for flying why can’t I have the right to pay less than $130?)))))
Options are already being considered on how to streamline the processing and consideration of medical certificate applications. CASA will consult further with industry on its overall cost recovery initiative to ensure that the most appropriate and efficient mechanisms are adopted. The implementation of increased cost recovery will be reviewed in 2006-07. And of course CASA has an ongoing review of service delivery methods, operating costs and the way it undertakes its core functions, which aims to identify further efficiencies.
Details of CASA fees, and the consultation undertaken by CASA in developing those fees, can be found at
http://www.casa.govau/corporat/fees/index.htm.
Yours sincerely
xxxxxxx
for
Geoff Kimber
Acting General Manager
Corporate Relations
23 January 2006