Wow!
I've come across this debate several times on this forum before, and I thought I knew where it was going - but it seems to have taken a turn haven't seen before! I'd never come across the argument that dual time can't count as flight training unless it's part of a recognised course.
When M14P pointed this out, I took a close look at the GID, and it seems you're correct in saying the only time you can log P/UT is if you're "under instruction for the purpose of gaining a licence or rating, or for conversion to an aircraft type within an aircraft rating group or class." Therefore you can't log P/UT. This is exaclyt the same argument as people are using to explain why you can't log P/US! So, according to the GID, neither P/UT nor P/US is correct.
Ok, so here's my take on it. First of all, we're not getting any guidance from the GID. If anyone can find any definitive document which says what we
should do (rather than what we shouldn't do) I'd like to hear about it, but it seems there isn't any.
Next point: your log-book is
your personal record of your flying. Essentially, you can write whatever you want in there, so long as you have some way of providing evidence of your flight times in certain categories of flight. So, if it's your personal log-book, and you've got no guidance from the CAA, the best thing to do is whatever will best enable you to provide evidence of flight times.
The three types of flight times that you're likely to be asked for (which are relevant to this discusion) are:
- Total time
- P1 time
- Instructional time for the purpose of gaining a license, rating, etc...
There is no issue with total time - whether you log your dual as P/UT or P/US, your total time will still be the same.
There is also no issue, as far as I can see, with instructional time. No one is interested in the total instructional time, only in the time for this particular rating. Let's give an example: say I was to do an IMC rating. One of the requirements of the rating is to do at least a minimum amount of dual time, with an instructor, for this rating.
Now, my log-book might contain some dual flights which were not part of this training. It might contain some aerobatic instruction, for example, or a cross-channel check-out as required by my club. If I'd logged this dual time as P/US, it wouldn't affect my P/UT totals, so no problem. If I'd logged it as P/UT, however, would it affect my totals? No! Because the only thing that matters here is the total instruction time given
for the IMC rating. There is no way that I could pass my aerobatic training off as IMC training! The aircraft I did it in is very unlikely to have the required instruments for IMC training, apart from which, the Notes column (where I might have written "slow roles and half Cuban-8's) will give the game away! The cross-channel check-out isn't quite as clear-cut, but at the end of my IMC course, the FTO will need to verify that I've completed the required number of hours, and stamp my log-book. If I'm trying to include my cross-channel check-out in these hours, the FTO will quickly realise that my figures don't match theirs, and my logbook won't be stamped. So, for the purpose of gaining licenses, ratings, etc. I don't think it makes any difference whether you log your miscellaneous dual as P/UT or P/US.
Finally, there is the issue of P1 time - certain licenses and ratings require a mimumum amount of P1 time, and your insurance company will also want to know your P1 time. In this case, I'd rather under-log my time than over-log it, for fear of having my insurance invalidated if the insurance company's interpretation of the rules is different to mine. So it's
better to log the dual time as P/UT, and risk under-quoting your P1 time, than to log as P/US, and risk over-quoting.
However, as I said earlier, it's your personal logbook, and you can do whatever you're most happy with.
Based on the outcome of previous threads on this subject, I've always logged any dual time with an instructor as P/UT. I was always reasonably sure this was correct, but never 100%. Now, though, I'm much less sure that this is correct - but it's what I'll continue to do, for the reasons I've stated above.
FFF
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