Instructor Shortage.
 

Interesting to see in today's Australian Aviation section an ad entitled "Rusty Flying Instructors".
There is a shortage of well qualified instructors and there has been a number of ads in the media but this one goes a step further by offering to get you current again for FREE and give you a full-time position. Almost an offer too good to be true!

The organisation is the Royal Aero Club of WA and there would certainly be worse places to be than Perth. Who knows but they may also be paying above award salary and treating people like human beings!
Anyway seems the worm is definitely turning reflected by the pilot shortage right through the industry both domestically and internationally at present.

Pilot training is fast becoming a bit of an issue, is anyone else out there having trouble finding a good reasonably experienced instructor who is readily available?

yeh we've been hiring complete morons recently, people who haven't flown in 15 years etc.

Significantly worrying.

Loved instructing, the most rewarding flying I've done. Would be back doing it tomorrow if i didn't have to put up with the Paperwork Bullsh#t....... Do you know how many times you have to sign your name just to send someone solo?????? I remember not so long ago when the student would just get a medical, the CFI would write out the student licence, and then when I was happy with the students ability, I could step out and let them go for a lap by themselves:ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh:

I got out of instructing, when it was taking over 2 months to get a SPL back off CASA :ugh:

RAA is looking better all the time :(

Is it really worth it, crap wages and conditions, par for the course.

Work as a storeman and earn 35 to 40k. Will they offer me this money.

Probably not.:ugh:

had to have a giggle at the "crap wages" bit...

when I had my wee "incident" with a student (which, just briefly, entailed me saving an aircraft AND his ass after he did a very very silly thing), the flight ended up being 0.4 hrs... and I got paid $6.00... BEFORE tax... :ugh:

still, at least we didn't get charged a landing fee i guess... ;)

c'mon KiwiChick - more detail pls.
Curiosity is getting the better of me.

And $6 BEFORE tax - sounds like something the Australian Govt would do.

I loved instructing and would go back tomorrow if the pay and conditions were OK. which leads me to the question.
What could I expect with the following, held grade 1 ME CIR ATO approvals CFI approval aero's formation training around 8,000 hrs instructing.

I am a retired airline pilot thinking of getting back into part-time instructing.Have made a few enquiries around the place but it's difficult to convince yourself to work for such low pay.I have another part-time training job which pays good money so why would i bother?

Hey Kingtoad! Will PM you... unless there's a thread on here somewhere

"really, really dumb things that people do... and the really dumb instructors that don't notice... " :ok: :ok:



there is however a photo on proon of the carnage... lol

Instructor shortage
 

RENURPP

What do you reckon your worth as an instructor? Don't forget if it's not what you are doing now, you may have to refresh your knowledge.
I reckon the C172 may not be as well equiped as the 717.

I'd love to instruct, as with everyone else the money's the problem.
I'm a former chief pilot, few years of charter work so i bring a bit with me to the table.

I moved back to Melb with the intention of becoming an instructor. So what was i expected to do? Fork out $15K and i was told that the best i could be offered was $300-350 a week casual wages. You'd have to be mad! This was with the mob with the best pay in town too!!

So i did what many others have done, left aviation and walked into a job with nowhere near the responibilities/stress and earning $1000+ p/w.

Instructors are worth at least whatever they can get elsewhere. Pilots are not muppets we have significant skills and the aura of just being a pilot opens doors (silly, but true). When unemployment is low we can find well paying jobs in other industries. I'm not going to take a significant pay cut just to get back in the cockpit. I love flying and am lucky enough to have a weekend job which keeps the 'hand in'. If i didn't i would go pay for a few hours a month, fly at my leisure and still be well ahead financially.

I've got 1500 hours, all the useful bells and whistles. So what would it take for me to instruct?
Either pay for my training and a $45k salary, i'm happy to be bonded, this is a 2 way street after all.
Or if i have to pay for my training then it'd have to be $50k+ . Lot of people will look at this and think he's crazy, but i can get better than this elsewhere. At the end of the day this is business, i'm not gonna cut my own legs off because i love it. I've got a life and responsibilities too that need to be looked after.
So any offers? :E

Young instructors will work for low pay to build hours.
If you legislated to set, say, a 2000 hr minimum experience level prior to someone obtaining an instructor rating, then schools would have to pay a decent wage to get people who could be making good money elsewhere, and flying schools would be staffed by experienced pilots, both good things in my view.

The cost of flying training would rise, turning people off the idea and maybe making it hard for schools to stay afloat in the short term, but if (as we are told) the aviation industry is going to continue expanding, the demand for pilots should drive wages up across the board and make it worthwhile for young people to invest in a CPL.

The alternative is to continue as we are, with low-hour instructors working for not much and no incentive for more experienced people to come back into the training system and pass on what they've learned.

It is promising though that many flight training organisations are now paying at least the award salary for their instructors. It is good as it means that people who are recieving low casual wages can find somewhere that is willing to pay them what theyre worth!!!! Of course there are still places that are paying and treating their instructors like crap :ugh:- but the instructors are realising that they can get better conditions elsewhere - and hopefully soon enough there will be more schools paying what they should be!

For anyone wondering what decent conditions are out there, im hearing is between $35 and 45K for a few places for a grade 2 Instructor. Obviously not great - but better than the past. :D

So for anyone seemingly "stuck" on crappy wages - go take a look around, and see if you can find some better conditions. Good luck!:ok:

Mo

Casual Rates?
 

Guys,

out of interest can someone give me a rough guide of casual rates and how it works these days? I have a Grade 2 with some other bits (aeros, form...). If I wanted to do a bit of instructing on the side apart from the day job, are you paid per flying hour? What is the ballpark going rate?

PM if you prefer, but am interested in "giving something back".

Cheers!

Just had a quick look at the GA award which you can get your hands on at afap.org.au. If you want all the details go have a look there.

A pilot flying an a/c up to 1360kg gets $31489 pa. If you need to use IFR then you get another $4435. Gde 3 gets nothing extra, Gde 2 gets $2524 and a Gde 1 gets an extra $5050 pa.

If you're casual you should receive 1/800th of your full time equivalent plus 25% per flying hour. So a gde 2 not teaching IFR in smaller training a/c would get 31489+2524/800x1.25=$53.14 per flying hour.

Unless you work for Basair, then it's $31/hr.:E

Hourly rate
 

Award rate for casual instructing is 1/800th of the annual wage you would otherwise be getting.

For a M/E, G1, IFR it is around $58 per hour.

I recently heard of a large international flying school at Parafield offering ATO's $29.95 per hour. I wounder if they make the connection between not having staff stay / join and this sort of attitude??

Folks, we finally have these penny pinching wankers on the ropes, if you don't stand up and demand award wages now, you prostitute yourself and future generations of pilots.

Think about it!

And don't forget

If I returned to instructing there would be every chance I would end up in either the same or very similiar training aircraft that I left almost 30 years ago!!

I will stick to the glass cockpit for a while yet.

Quite a few training schools use planes with glass cockpits. :ok:

Standards!
 

Until the regulator starts doing something about the poor standards of instruction, standardisation and testing and the resulting poor product, it will remain a mess, and the industry will pay sometime in the future:ugh::ugh:

Certainly good pay and conditions will help, but it is not the only problem.

CASA have to kick @rse as well. :eek:

C**P!
 

When will some of you people get off your high horse ane start to appreciate you are not the left (or right) hand of god!

There are flight schools (and I am really close to one!) that pay well above award, but when a position is advertised we only get a few responses (and not of any quality). The salaries offered by some mobs (ours included) would put the figures mentioned above to shame, but the quality of applicants make a garbo (and I mean no disrespect to garbos, just trying to make a comparision. Actually they might be better value, at least they arn't up them selves!) seem the man for the job.

Wake up to yourselves and be realistic, you are only pilots!