UK CAA alternatives for taking ATPL exams

[Jaair]

Hi everyone,

In light of the UK CAAs decision to refuse quality controls (https://www.bristol.gs/caa-refuse-either-credit-exams-introduce-quality-controls/) in the new exam questions being published together with recent negative feedback from colleagues I am looking into alternative aviation authorities to complete my ATPL exams (I am yet to start my studies). I was very keen on sticking with Bristol so may go with one of their European partner schools such as Bartolini.

Do you have any suggestions based on experience with other CAAs?

[superflanker]

Hi everyone,

In light of the UK CAAs decision to refuse quality controls (https://www.bristol.gs/caa-refuse-either-credit-exams-introduce-quality-controls/) in the new exam questions being published together with recent negative feedback from colleagues I am looking into alternative aviation authorities to complete my ATPL exams (I am yet to start my studies). I was very keen on sticking with Bristol so may go with one of their European partner schools such as Bartolini.

Do you have any suggestions based on experience with other CAAs?

The article you are quoting is quite old ¿(I think around 2016-early 2017)?
It's not that bad at all. You will always find new questions but usually this will not decide if you fail or you pass.

And if you are very unlucky you may sit on a date where a whole batch of new questions appear for an especific exam (I.E this happened with OPS, FPL around september 2017). Even if this is the case, the question banks (at least BGS) update at a very fast pace, so normally on the next sitting you will be able to pass.

I passed 7 exams on the UK CAA in 1 sitting and I'm no genius.

[Jaair]

The article you are quoting is quite old ¿(I think around 2016-early 2017)?
It's not that bad at all. You will always find new questions but usually this will not decide if you fail or you pass.

And if you are very unlucky you may sit on a date where a whole batch of new questions appear for an especific exam (I.E this happened with OPS, FPL around september 2017). Even if this is the case, the question banks (at least BGS) update at a very fast pace, so normally on the next sitting you will be able to pass.

I passed 7 exams on the UK CAA in 1 sitting and I'm no genius.

Apologies, I didn't realise the report was so old. May I ask when you sat your exams? Was it with the new quadrant style questions?

[superflanker]

I did them a month ago, all in the quadrant version.

[Jaair]

I did them a month ago, all in the quadrant version.

Great, congrats on passing! All the best and good luck with the rest of your studies.

[ElliZ]

I started of at Bristol but moved to Orbit Ground School in Arnhem, Netherlands last year. Main reason for me was Orbit Ground School being a lot closer than Bristol. I live in Germany.
At Orbit they can arrange exams for you with most of the EASA CAAs. Belgium is pretty cheap. That's what they normally suggest to foreign students as it seems the CAA in Belgium has least bureaucracy.
All 14 exams are 440 Euros in total. But you have to write them in 2 Blocks, each Block split in 2 days within 1 week. Bloc A Day 1Flight Planning 2 hrsMass and Balance 1 hr Performance 1 hr Bloc A Day 2General Navigation 2 hrsRadio Navigation 1.5 hrsPrinciples of Flight 1 hrHuman Performance 1 hr

Bloc B Day 1Aircraft General Knowledge 2 hrsInstrumentation 1.5 hrs Air Law 1 hr Bloc B Day 2Meteorology 2 hrs Operational Procedures 1.15 hrsVFR Communications 0.5 hrIFR Communications 0.5 hr

You can start with Block A or B it doesn't matter. Just the subjects can't be moved around. Hope this helps.

[superflanker]

Great, congrats on passing! All the best and good luck with the rest of your studies.

The same to you, and don't give up on it!

[Officer Kite]

Seeing how other countries are doing it makes me realise i was perhaps lucky to do them in Lithuania.

Exams are only 5.70 eu each so about 80eu to sit them all, you can choose exactly what date and what time you sit them (within 6 ten day block sessions that you open when you want) ... no one dictates to you that certain subjects have to be sat with other subjects or anything like that at all, you have total freedom to do what you want when you want to at any time of the month/year ... you can decide in the morning your ready for an exam and go online and book to do it that afternoon (providing a slot is available, which it always was). They obviously can't have 10 guys showing up at once to do GNav obviously because they only have a couple of the annexes.

There are new questions but nothing too difficult if you didn't just memorise answers and did understand them.

[scarofly]

Lithuanian CAA will update the question bank by the end of September 2018. Do you know guys if it can become quadrant style afterward but with the same kind of question or all new questions with/without quadrant? I think the UK CAA is the first to be updated with more and more CAAs being updated, but when I read the report from BGS, it's quite scary. Did someone pass OPS at UK CAA recently?

[justmaybe]

Slightly off thread, but do all candidates get the same questions for a particular subject with uk caa quadrant? So if 20 candidates are sitting Air Law for example will they have identical Qs or will each have a tranch of randomly generated Qs?

[paco]

The exams are random and so are the appendices. Two people sitting together will not get the same exam.

[justmaybe]

Tks guys, that perfectly answers my question.