Please read if you are considering the qatar airways mpl programme:
Please read if you are considering the qatar airways mpl programme:
You are being issued with a QCAA MPL not an EASA MPL.
I started with CTC Aviation’s Qatar Airways MPL program in January 2016 and was in Hamilton, NZ to do my ground school and flight training. A few months in we were told that if, after our initial time at Qatar, we wanted to return to Europe then we’d need to redo all 14 ATPL exams as well as obtain a CPL because the license we get issued is a Qatari one, not an EASA license (even though we were doing EASA theory exams).
Fortunately a couple weeks later the Head of Training (UK) came out to NZ to view the facilities and hold a Q&A session. I asked him about the license issue and he said point blank that this is true.
If you want to come back to Europe then you will have to redo ALL 14 ATPL exams and obtain a CPL.
He explained that this was because the validity of your EASA examinations is only 3 years and our initial time with Qatar Airways is longer than this.
We had 3 stages of assessment to get onto the course and at no point was this mentioned, and not only that but none of the other Qatar Courses knew about this. We spoke to people who had finished their time in NZ and were returning to the UK to start their sim training, they didn’t know about it. No one on my course knew about it and we had two new courses started whilst I was out there, and they were coming up to us because they didn’t know about this.
CTC have not told any cadets about the license issue.
I consulted with the CAA who confirmed to me there is also no conversion in place at present to convert from a QCAA License to an EASA License
One particularly interesting point was that whilst I was in NZ, applications for the Qatar MPL opened twice. I decided to look on the CTC page about the Qatar Course. The first time, around June 2016, under the “what’s included” subsection it stated: “EASA MPL License Issue” the second opening, around July 2016 this had been changed to “QCAA MPL License Issue”.
CTC had been advertising the course as an EASA MPL license issue.
I have screenshots of both these pages if anyone would like to see.
To conclude:
You will be issued with a QCAA MPL, this is NOT valid in Europe and there is not conversion course at present. Think long and hard about applying for this course. Unless you are willing to redo your 14 ATPL exams and obtain a CPL your entire flying career will be in Qatar. You may love it there but if you don’t, you are extremely limited in where you can go (I’ve also heard that Emirates and Qatar have a no poaching policy). I wanted to highlight this to people because neither I nor anyone else on any Qatar Course knew about this. You need to make an informed decision and cannot do that without all the information.
The best advice would be to obtain an EASA License and then after an initial stint at a European Carrier move out there, because all you have to do is a sim check every 6 months to keep your license current.
Any questions, please feel free to ask