Vortime. Must agree with you completly on this one. I've started the PPL recently and have to say its a very unprofessional set up out there. The instructors are decent enough blokes, but i dont believe in spending EUR 147.00 per hour to have my head wrecked.
You do have to book weeks and weeks in advance to get a weekend slot (for those of us that work 9-5 mon-fri) and even then theres no real point as when you arrive (like you said) your name will have been tipp-exed over, you will find yourself having to fly with an instructor you've never flown before, who doesnt know your ability, areas that need to be worked on etc so straight away you waste a little time getting a rapport with him.
Its bad enough this happens,but they dont even have the decency to let you know if your "pre Booked" lession has been changed so therefore you can arrive out there and find theres all sorts of delays, and youre fobbed off with some feeble excuse because the flight centre hasnt the most basic of organisational skills to have in place an instructor and aircraft which you could have booked weeks in advance.
Granted you cant always expect that when you turn up for a lesson,that the instructor you booked and an aircraft will be available. Delays can happen, instructors have the weekends off, however when it a case where you're almost always guaranteed that youll be sitting around for ages, watching the clock, waiting for any random instructor to become available and then pay a fortune to do it really takes alot of the enjoyment out of the whole experience.Itmakes that period of time you worked hard to save the money and went without things seem much harder.
Anyway, now that I've finished ranting just one final thing; For anyone thinking about National Flight Centre in dublin as a FTO to do their PPL in carefully consider what I said because it is a real hassle with those guys. And I cant see anything changing. Why? Because there arent many places around offering flight training. And for that reason alone they dont have to bother their arse suiting anyone else but themselves.
Bring on the competition, and National Flight Centre
lease get your act together, for christ sake!