Originally Posted by
richatom
Depends who you listen to - read the thread. Seems that if the passengers hire the plane, and hire me, then it is legal. This is what I have done on some occasions when I didn't know the pax well enough to be sure that they would reimburse me if I hired the plane myself. On other occasions, where I knew the pax well, I just hired the plane myself and got reimbursed later. I realise now that by the letter of the law I shouldn't have been doing the latter, though in practical sense it makes no difference to operational safety.
Incidentally, this distinction is not covered in my air law books and I am yet to find this explained anywhere in any legal text.
Have you checked the insurance status of the aeroplane you're hiring?
You may well find that with you using for (probably) illegal "AOC" work then the insurance will probably be invalid, too - potentially leaving you with a huge liability and risk of prosecution if there's an incident.