ogounn
11th Jul 2007, 15:40
Dear All
The pan am flight academy in MSP " provide" training for the B744 with atractive price.
If you're foreigner, after completing the TSA's formalities:ugh:, you'll recive the clearance to study in this school, and ONLY in this school. If the school didn't respect the contract you're :mad: screwed!
I would like to explan my "story" with this center:
Background:
I am an airline pilot working on a freelance basis for several companies around the world. The type of plane for which I'm currently certified – the L1011 – is disappearing from service and I have not had any contracts in some time. At the beginning of this year I received a contract proposal from a company which wanted to engage my services provided that I became certified to fly the B747-400. Obtaining this certification would be at my own expense. I decided to invest my own money to obtain this certification and contacted the Pan Am International Flight Academy in April. This school provides both classroom training and rents flight simulators from Northwest Airlines.
I was told that there would be a course at the beginning of May. Therefore, I purchased an airline ticket and reserved a rental property. Just two days before my departure, the school called to tell me that everything was canceled due to issues arising from the NWA bankruptcy and that they would advise me later about any future opportunity to take this course. This news, which may have been well known in the United States for some time, came as a surprise to me and caused me the loss of my airfare and the deposit on the rental property. After all, I had no reason to believe that the school would call at such a late date to cancel my training.
Three weeks later, Pan Am called me to say that the course for obtaining certification to fly the B747-400 had reopened. I therefore purchased another ticket and began the course along with one other pilot. My partner in this course – already a B747-200 pilot – proceeded more rapidly through the course due to his professional experience. He completed the course before me, after about three weeks of training together.
The Current Situation:
My course should have continued at that point. But instead of continuing, I waited twelve days in my hotel room for a phone call that would provide me with the schedule for my training on the flight simulator.
Here I'd like to make an important point. Becoming certified on an aircraft such as this one requires the following of a consistent training regimen. If, for whatever reason, there is a break in the training regimen, one loses a portion of what has just been acquired the previous days. It's not simply a question of picking up where one left off in the prior lesson after there has been a gap of several days. That is what has happened to me.
After waiting for twelve days, the school got back in contact with me. I took three additional simulator sessions to get back to the point at which the training was disrupted. That should have left me needing just about two more sessions prior to taking my certification exam. I expected to be back in my country by the 14th of July.
But, after taking these three additional sessions, I find myself again without any news from the school despite my numerous telephone calls.
My simulator session on Sunday took place as agreed, but when I showed up for my session on Monday, I was told that one of the two simulators was out of service and the other was being used by NWA. Since then I have received no information about a future schedule and my calls go unreturned.
Conclusion
After getting as much information as I could, it appears that Pan Am really does not have an instructor available for this type of course. In other words, they had me pay them $12,900 without having a structure in place to reasonably provide the proposed training. In addition, the twelve days without the opportunity to practice required approximately $5,000 for additional sessions.
Monday it's started over again with an additional five day wait. This will require additional payments, etc.
Not counting the lost time due to the first course cancellation, Pan Am has now caused me to lose two weeks on my own schedule which has resulted in my not being able to have the interview with the company which wished to engage my services in the first place. There has also been the significant additional cost of food and lodging here in the Twin Cities.
Pan Am has shown itself to be very unprofessional by selling me a training program without having the infrastructure to provide what they offered.
So, Guys, you're coment are welcome:ok:
The pan am flight academy in MSP " provide" training for the B744 with atractive price.
If you're foreigner, after completing the TSA's formalities:ugh:, you'll recive the clearance to study in this school, and ONLY in this school. If the school didn't respect the contract you're :mad: screwed!
I would like to explan my "story" with this center:
Background:
I am an airline pilot working on a freelance basis for several companies around the world. The type of plane for which I'm currently certified – the L1011 – is disappearing from service and I have not had any contracts in some time. At the beginning of this year I received a contract proposal from a company which wanted to engage my services provided that I became certified to fly the B747-400. Obtaining this certification would be at my own expense. I decided to invest my own money to obtain this certification and contacted the Pan Am International Flight Academy in April. This school provides both classroom training and rents flight simulators from Northwest Airlines.
I was told that there would be a course at the beginning of May. Therefore, I purchased an airline ticket and reserved a rental property. Just two days before my departure, the school called to tell me that everything was canceled due to issues arising from the NWA bankruptcy and that they would advise me later about any future opportunity to take this course. This news, which may have been well known in the United States for some time, came as a surprise to me and caused me the loss of my airfare and the deposit on the rental property. After all, I had no reason to believe that the school would call at such a late date to cancel my training.
Three weeks later, Pan Am called me to say that the course for obtaining certification to fly the B747-400 had reopened. I therefore purchased another ticket and began the course along with one other pilot. My partner in this course – already a B747-200 pilot – proceeded more rapidly through the course due to his professional experience. He completed the course before me, after about three weeks of training together.
The Current Situation:
My course should have continued at that point. But instead of continuing, I waited twelve days in my hotel room for a phone call that would provide me with the schedule for my training on the flight simulator.
Here I'd like to make an important point. Becoming certified on an aircraft such as this one requires the following of a consistent training regimen. If, for whatever reason, there is a break in the training regimen, one loses a portion of what has just been acquired the previous days. It's not simply a question of picking up where one left off in the prior lesson after there has been a gap of several days. That is what has happened to me.
After waiting for twelve days, the school got back in contact with me. I took three additional simulator sessions to get back to the point at which the training was disrupted. That should have left me needing just about two more sessions prior to taking my certification exam. I expected to be back in my country by the 14th of July.
But, after taking these three additional sessions, I find myself again without any news from the school despite my numerous telephone calls.
My simulator session on Sunday took place as agreed, but when I showed up for my session on Monday, I was told that one of the two simulators was out of service and the other was being used by NWA. Since then I have received no information about a future schedule and my calls go unreturned.
Conclusion
After getting as much information as I could, it appears that Pan Am really does not have an instructor available for this type of course. In other words, they had me pay them $12,900 without having a structure in place to reasonably provide the proposed training. In addition, the twelve days without the opportunity to practice required approximately $5,000 for additional sessions.
Monday it's started over again with an additional five day wait. This will require additional payments, etc.
Not counting the lost time due to the first course cancellation, Pan Am has now caused me to lose two weeks on my own schedule which has resulted in my not being able to have the interview with the company which wished to engage my services in the first place. There has also been the significant additional cost of food and lodging here in the Twin Cities.
Pan Am has shown itself to be very unprofessional by selling me a training program without having the infrastructure to provide what they offered.
So, Guys, you're coment are welcome:ok: