But what is stopping him or her doing the CPL exams and flight test? Money? In the case of the 200 hour PPL, perhaps this is the case. The 700 hour PPL would have difficulty saying they were short of cash. Please don't say they don't have the time. If they don't, how will they ever find time to instruct. Perhaps they couldn't cope with the ground exams? Need I say any more?
Why do you think an experienced PPL can't argue they're short of cash? I am, I have a poorly payed job (for what the hours I do and the qualifications I have ... so it's not exclusive to FI's) and a large family. I have managed to continue to fly for the last 20 years by various means, but I sure as hell can say that I am short of cash
Time
IS another issue despite what you say, in fact with me it's the main one. I could easily do a day of instructing a week, but it would be very difficult to find the time to attend the now compulsary ground school part of the CPL's as well as the FI course. It could be done, but it would take two years of my holiday time just for the ground exams, and that's before the FIR course!
In France PPL's teach and the French do not interpret the requirement to demonstrate CPL knowledge as having to pass the CPL ground exams ... so why do we here? I'd happily self study and take the exams if I didn't have to attend GS to do it ... again, this is somthing you didn't have to do before. The CPL exams have now been geared toward the fast track CPL / fATPL and the way they are layed down is absolutely irrellevent to PPL instruction. There must be a way to
demonstrate in-depth knowledge for PPL instructors that doesn't mean you have to prove you can go on to be an airline pilot ... Many of us don't want too!
SS