To me at-least, the answer here is really obvious.
You don't list a single total.
Take me as an example:
- I hold a JAA licence: so JAA are only really interested in my "aeroplane hours" as they define it, so I list that [split of-course into PiC and P/UT], although separately also my time in certified sims in training.
- I also hold an FAA licence: they count my 3-axis microlight hours also, so they get a separate and larger total.
- I'm a BMAA check pilot; they don't really care about my time in aeroplanes outside the microlight category, but care deeply about my microlight time. So they get several totals: total microlight time, PiC 3-axis, PiC flexwing, and "all other flying".
- I'm an instructor, so I run a total of airborne instructional time.
- I do some development test flying of research simulators. JAA, FAA and BMAA all couldn't give a fig about that, but the universities I work with are really quite interested, so they get three numbers - my test flying experience, my total flying time, and my time on research simulators.
- And finally there's my own ego. Well that has two numbers to think about: time PiC airborne, and total time airborne. Even my ego however isn't really all that impressed with sim time.
Other people's needs and flying experience requirements will vary (and I run some other totals like tailwheel time, FAA cross-country time, JAA "complex" time, FAA high performance time, time by sole reference to instruments, night... because those sometimes become important to somebody somewhere). But in these days of electronic logbooks, maintaining all those separate totals really isn't that hard and people in "aviation authority" over us are generally quite bright enough to handle more than one number.
G