Zero to Holding Pool - How much the modular route cost me
 

I just thought that some of you would be interested to know how much the modular route cost me.

March 2002 - 45hour PPL Course with Solent Flight Southampton £6885
April 2002 - Class 2 Medical £150
Nov 2002 - CAA Licence issue fee £143

I completed my PPL in 45 hours so total was £7178 plus 2 landings at Bristol and 2 landings at Exeter.

Jan 03 - 5 hours Night Training £700
Jan 03 - CAA Licence issue fee £64

Jan 03 - Initial Class 1 Medical £430 (plus travelling costs)

May 03 - Enroled with Bristol Ground School. Module 1 £1100

Oct 03 - IMC Course (Not required, but good to have) £2558
Oct 03 - IMC Test £163
Oct 03 - CAA Licence Issue fee £67

Mar 04 - Module One exam Fees (8 exams) £440
Mar 04 - 2 weeks Bristol B & B (Approx) £350 (plus travel costs)
Mar 04 - 1 week Gatwick B & B (Approx) £150 (plus travel costs)

Mar 04 - Bristol Module 2 £800

May 04 – Multi Engine Rating & Test, Professional Air Training, Bournemouth £2885
May 04 – CAA Licence issue £70

Oct 04 - Module Two exam Fees (6 exams) £330
Oct 04 - 2 weeks Bristol B & B (Approx) £350 (plus travel costs)
Oct 04 - 1 week Gatwick B & B (Approx) £150 (plus travel costs)

Dec 04 – Started Instrument Rating 55hr course, Professional Air Training, Bournemouth

Jan 05 – Class 1 Medical Renewal £70

Jan 05 – Passed Instrument Rating with 56 hours training plus 2 tests, £15515
Jan 05 – CAA Test Fee £1063 (Partialled on first attempt)
Jan 05 – Started CPL 15 hour course (Multi Engine), PAT, Bournemouth

Feb 05 – Passed CPL with 15 hours training plus 2 tests, £5579
Feb 05 - CAA Test Fee £1063 (Partialled on first attempt)
Mar 05 – CAA Licence Issue - £194

May 05 – MEP Renewal £336

Jun 05 – MCC with Jetlinx on the A320 £3500

Jan 06 – IR Renewal, PAT, Bournemouth £820
Jan 06 – Class 1 Medical Renewal £104

Apr 06 – CTC Stage 2 £164

May 06 – MEP Renewal, PAT, Bournemouth £603

Jun 06 – CTC Stage 4 (AQC Course) £6691

Now swimming in CTC's Holding Pool, Total Cost of Training is £53489. but……………..
That figure is only for the training.

Hour building / Pleasure flying is:

PA28, Warrior, Arrow and Archer hire from passing my PPL to date is £12599
BE76 hire from passing my MEP to date is £2830

Total Rental £15429

So the total cost of achieving fATPL, with 245 hours was £68918.

A lot of the rental figure was shared by the people I took with me. At a guess I would think I probably got back about £5000 by sharing rental costs.

I didn’t choose the cheapest way, there are ways that this figure could have been reduced.

1) No requirement to do an IMC (However it was good preparation for the IR and probably helped me pass the test with the minimal IR training hours)
2) No requirement to renew class 1 medical until you need it for a job
3) Didn’t need to do an MCC because the CTC course covers that requirement (However would I have passed the CTC course without the 20hours and superb training I received with Jetlinx??)
4) The CPL could have been done in a Single Engine Aircraft.
5) I could have done the hour building in the states (That would have meant time off work, air fares and no friends to share the cost)
6) The MEP could have been done as part of the IR

It’s worth looking at these prices and comparing them to the figures that people are quoting for taking the modular route.

Of course if you were to go the integrated route with a school that has an arrangement with an airline and you meet the required standard you are home and dry for a similar sum of money.

If however, you take the integrated route and do not go straight into an airline job you will still have to pay for renewals, CTC (If that’s the way you wish to go) and flying hours to keep yourself marketable.

Food for thought

SW

good post - looked at PAT's website and they seem quite expensive. Which airline are you going with or do you not know yet??

Newbie

I didn't really feel that PAT were that expensive. In any case you should look at the positive comments they get from previous students http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=233912

Not assigned an airline yet and no idea when I'll be leaving the pool.

SW

Modular pricing appreciated
 

Thanks for the cost breakdown, an enlightening summary. Appreciate that corners can be cut, PAT may not be the cheapest - but have an excellent reputation, built on years of experience. Good luck with the pool!

SkyHigh

I still find it hard to see people doing a ppl in a month! Out of interest how did you afford it all? Hour building really worries me as I dnt really want to go abroad

It doesn't look as though he did the PPL in a month?

Interesting post.

I started my PPL in March 02 and completed it in November 02. I was flying once or twice a week depending on work and the weather.

How did I afford it? Let's just say I had a well paid job, and I'm taking a significant pay cut by becoming an FO :eek:

Luckily I've sent Mrs Sky Wave out to work whilst I lounge around waiting for CTC to call me :ok:

Great post Skywave. Interestingly enough I am about to start with PAT in the next few months and we seem to have taken reasonably similar paths so far with things like the IMC rating etc.

Fortunately I am debt free which I guess is why I have been pretty poor at keeping track of the expenses along the way. What struck me was just how much cash I would have spent when it is all done. Like you say this will exclude living expenses, cost of flying kit (must be thousands in itself) and most importantly loss of income whilst I have been studying.

Great post Sky Wave and good luck with the job...CTC cadets dont swim for long before getting pulled out, dried off and thrown into the RHS of an airliner. :ok:

Top marks for honesty! A refreshing change from the usual "Go modular, you'll get the same licence as integrated but you'll have £30k to spend on a type rating" nonsense that we usually get on here.

Best of luck for whatever's next!:ok:

sorry my mistake! Good luck, wish i was you! Dread to think what you were being paid previously!!what were you doing out of interest, as im near you and there arent that many well paid jobs in this area

Skywave, thank you for that excellent post. To fill in the gaps, what would you assess as your accommodation and other incidental costs during your training? If, as I assume, you lived at home during this training, perhaps you can give some kind of estimate of the kind of costs some of our wannabes would incur.

The reason I ask is that, in some of the integrated or structured modular schools, accommodation is part of the price (yes, I know it's not at Oxford!), so it's reasonable to include it when making a comparison.

Scroggs

Newbie

:= That would be telling. Let’s just say I’ve been doing this job ever since I left school and I’m now 31. It was also very rare that I ever worked anywhere near home.:{


Scroggs

There were very few additional costs in my case because I only live 10 minutes away from Bournemouth airport.

I’ve listed the times during my training that accommodation was needed:-

Bristol Groundschool Module 1 – 12 Nights (approx figure included above)
Gatwick Module 1 Exams – 4 Nights (approx figure included above)
Bristol Groundschool Module 2 – 12 Nights (approx figure included above)
Gatwick Module 2 Exams – 4 Nights (approx figure included above)
Jetlinx MCC – 1 Night in a Gloucester hotel during the Groundschool weekend.(£50)
CTC Stage 3 – 1 Night at a local hotel prior to my interview (£50) - (Even though I’m only 30 mins away, it wasn’t worth the risk)
CTC Stage 4 – 20 Nights (Included in the cost that I’ve given for CTC)

I was very fortunate with the weather and training slots and my CPL/IR took about 9 weeks. I would strongly suggest that anyone budgeting for accommodation during their CPL/IR allow for 12 weeks.

All of the equipment needed to do my PPL was included in the cost of the course. These items were:-

Books for the PPL ground exams
A Chart
A Knee Board
A CRP-1 Computer (you’ll need CRP-5 for ATPL studies)
Protractor
Rule
Permanent Marker Pens
Audio Tape for learning RT
Flight Bag
Fuel Drainer
Headphones
Logbook

Other expenses include:

Charts £14 per year
Additional headphones £400 (The set that I got as a PPL were very basic)
CRP-5 Computer £72


I can’t think of any other necessary expenses, except for petrol/travelling expense.


The final consideration is loss of earnings. I already had a mortgage at the point I decided to start my training so I had to take the distance learning option to enable me to continue paying the mortgage and keep up the flying training.

Hope this helps.

SW

Skywave

If i didnt know better I thought you were my wife, another great bookkeeper :D

Great post and agree that it puts the modular or not discussion in a different perspective :)

Accomodation costs
 

Scroggs et al,

I am currently looking at accomodation in Bournemouth as I will be starting my CPL/IR in the next couple of months. There are various options available from basic B&B's, guesthouses, small/big hotels and living with families. If you leave it to the last minute then you might be able to swing a house share through something like the Gumtree website.

After looking at all of the above I am going for a room in a private house with a nice old duck and I understand a couple of other wannabees occupy the other rooms so hopefully I will have no shortage of drinking buddys. Price is £105 per week which includes all your meals. Nothing else to pay her and you get the full run of the place. The multi/CPL/IR will take me about 3 months as a cautious estimate so it will be 3 months of that plus the other indicidentals that crop up eg: beer money, meals out etc when you get cabin fever. This type of arrangement depends a lot on timing and being in the right place at the right time. You wouldn't expect to get something as cheap as this for attending say a 2 week brush up course. For that I know guys are getting rates of about £20-25 a night B&B.

Yes, thank you Pot. I'm not looking for accommodation! Virgin pays my mortgage quite adequately already, thanks. What I was looking for was an estimate of accommodation costs to go along with Sky Wave's course costs to complete the comparison data he's trying to provide. As some integrated or structured modular courses include accommodation, it's valid to include accommodation in a comparison of costs.

Scroggs

Err, I realise that and it was only intended to help you and the other wannabees looking in to fill in the blanks. You did ask the question after all.

Yes, alright then (though I'm not a wannabe!). So what we have is a ballpark £105 per week for accommodation while training. Say, £2700 for 6 months (over a total of 18 or so) to add to Sky Wave's figures.

Scroggs

Bear in mind when doing a cost comparison that, as Skywave said himself, he could have done it cheaper in places. I followed a similar path to skywave myself including going through the CTC scheme and I reckon the total cost of training was just over £36000, including all travel and accommodation costs directly related to my training. So the possibility is still there to obtain the licence and start flying commercially without getting buried in debt.

PW

You could go modular for a lot cheaper than the above though...hour building abroad etc..

£6885 for a ppl! rip-off

Doesn't seem particularly representative of the modular route to me