paying to go full time

[cesspit]

At the moment I am earning £10 - £16 per flying hour (with no salary or retainer)as an FI on a ad-hoc, part time basis.

Should I realistically expect more if I went full time, thus ditching my other, ground based, full time job?

[aerotowman]

Well Cesspit I think that 10 to 16 quid per hour is about the going rate for PPL instructors. I get £12/hour tacho time (nothing for groundschool) and no retainer as a part time FI.

I had toyed with the idea of giving up my very well paid day job to try and get a full time FI job, but have decided against it as the pay and conditions are totally crap. I'm not sure if I'll even continue with the part time instruction, but I'll definitely be going and paying to do some quality hour building.

The way I see it there are plenty of instructors out there with the magic 1000 hours and no proper job.

At the end of the day it depends upon how much money you earn in the week, and whether or not you can afford to pay for flying to keep everything current.

Good Luck

aerotowman.

[GT]

Cesspit, I instruct part-time; weekends, bank holidays etc., even some evenings on a regular basis. I would love to do it full-time but given the salaries out there I just can't afford to. My weekday job doesn't pay huge amounts but it sure beats what I would get instructing, by a quite an amount too. I wouldn't even mind taking some degree of wage cut but if I went on to instructor wages I would have to sell my house, sell my car and find myself a cardboard box to sleep in and a railway bridge to put it under!

I can instruct for PPL, IMC, Night and Multi but still this seems not to attract anything like a decent wage (and it's cost me a potful to be able to do this!). The truth of the matter is, even if an employer thinks that you are worth your weight in gold as an instructor, the whole thing in this country is so expensive, the margins so tight, that they cannot afford to pay any more than the bare minimum.

As for the so called instructor shortage that will put up wages for us all, well, I've not seen any great evidence of it. Sure, the self-improver route has gone, but look at some of the Pprune forums: lots of talk about people getting their instructor ticket because they've finished at Cabair or OATS or some place else but can't get onto an airline for love nor money.

Obviously, Cesspit, you'll have to make up your own mind up about things. I hope I haven't struck too much of a despondant note for you, this is just the way I see the situation, certainly at the moment.

Remember though, if you can hack the poor wages, it is brilliant fun and very rewarding.

Regards and best of luck, GT.

[Readback Correct]

Well I'm giving up my full time FI position to go part time, as there's very little work during the week. If you do want to go full time, wait until the spring.

[B clam]

If you want to instruct full time have you considered JEFTS at Barkston Heath/Church Fenton. They operate the Slingsby firefly and, as well as the basic handling skills, teach low-level, form, aeros etc.

I'm not sure of the quals but I know that there are several purely civilian FIs who work there. I believe the pay isn't too bad either

[MorePower]

Well cesspit, situation depends on whether or not this company will pay you a decent salary. For example, I was working at a school in Scotland part-time and earning £35 per day retainer, £15 per hour, £10 groundschool. As the winter and bad weather approached (shorter days), I took a job full time with the same company, who offered around £1400 per month plus IMC and night flying bonus. The trouble in the Instructing world at the moment (certainly in Scotland) has a lack of instructors with in excess of 700 hours. In fact we have recently been searching for a new unrestricted FI, and even offering reasonable salaries, we have experienced difficulties. Bottom line, if you want to move on quickly to airlines, move to a flying school full time where you are almost guaranteed the hours (even in winter). At the moment, I am averaging 60 hours per month(and thats in Scotland!!), however, working for a bigger school last winter, I only averaged 25 hours per month. Bottom line though, because the airlines seem to be taking on lower time pilots, the instructor market is already beginning to show signs of drying up, and if you can wait until summer time, your employer will almost certainly offer you a good salary.

Good luck with your decision.

[zzzz]

For a few years I struggled as a full time FI and mostly enjoyed the job. Now I too (just like everyone else who has replied) am doing it part time.

Money was one aspect, I now earn easily well in excess of double I ever did 'FI-ing'and that is after things like pension/tax contributions etc have been taken off and. I now have far more job security than I did as an instructor. It seems even the best schools can do things on a bit of a shoe string, the worst ones just rip you off and I have been there too.
Just to add to the doom and gloom, a friend of mine turned down a well paid job to go instructing full time, within 2 weeks the school he was working for went tits up.
All in all instructing P/T has been so much better fun as I am now flying for love and not food.
On a positive note there are well paid/secure instructing jobs out there but they tend to be of the CAP509 type and you need CPL/ IR Multi etc etc.
As for flying Slingsbys for the mil as BCalm suggests I think that too requires CPL/IR plus lots of aero/formation experience (correct me if I am wrong), jobs for the boys ie ex RAF.
Because PPL instructing is so part time and not considered in the professional light it should be it is just knackering up the industry in the long run. A PPL instructor is worth at least £18-20000pa, isn't that what driving instructors get paid? They don't spend £30000 on getting their qualifications.

[RVR800]

I agree with the sentiments expressed above

Dont give up the day job as instructing doesn't pay enough

There is no apparant shortage of Instructors

I think that the relevance of 'FI' ing to airline work is overplayed particularly
after say 1000 hours - this is because
most instructing is ab-initio and VFR/SE and the airlines need IFR ME.

'Just' need a Multi IR Instructor rating!

Its all a matter of supply and demand

There about 400 pilots with UK CPL/IRs
created every year

This was true until last year when it
was reduced by 1/2 due CAA JAR implementation

Thats a lot of supply...






[This message has been edited by RVR800 (edited 30 November 2000).]