I have a CRI rating on my license, and I have a lot of time on the phone and writing emails to the CAA trying to work out what I can do and (more importantly) what I can't do with it. The long and short of it is that no-one is quite sure.
The list of things which a CRI is definitely allowed to do is pretty much:
- club check rides provided that the student holds a valid and current SEP rating
- passenger currency rides (as a CRI, you're not a passenger) provided that the student holds a valid and current SEP rating
- the Biennial Flight With An Instructor provided that the student holds a valid and current SEP rating
- constant speed propellor, tail-wheel or other "complexity" differences training provided that the student holds a valid and current SEP rating (and you as the CRI have at least 10 hours PIC on that particular compexity)
It's also
probably OK for a CRI to give training to a pilot with a lapsed SEP rating provided that they hold a JAR (or other CAA-recognised ICAO) license with at least one
valid and
current type or class rating (e.g. Boeing 737, MEP etc).
As soon as you reach the point where the student holds no
valid JAR (or ICAO) type/class ratings, all bets seem to be off. That would seem to exclude teaching PPL(A) holders one day beyond the end of the SEP validity period, pilots whose medical has lapsed, and also students who hold sub-ICAO licenses such as the NPPL(A), NPPL(M) and NPPL(SLMG). My understanding is that a JAR PPL(TMG) should be OK though since it is a full, ICAO recognised license when used with a JAR medical.
So far the CAA have been pondering my questions since October and haven't managed to give definitive answers. Until they do, I'm sticking to what's in the "definitely OK" list given above.
Interestingly, however, my CRI rating does
not contain any clauses preventing me doing applied instrument training or aerobatics, as might appear on most freshly-minted FI(R) ratings. The renewal criteria are also a lot less onerous than those for an FI since I merely need to complete 10 hours (yes, ten) of instruction in the 12 months preceding the expiry date of my 3-year rating whereas a full FI must complete two out of a seminar, a flight test, and 100 hours (yes, one hundred) of instruction.
Can anyone spell mucking fuddle?
(Edited to correct my misunderstanding of the status of the TMG rating - since I don't fly them, I'd never looked before, and LASORS is not the easiest of bedtime reading material!)