Switching from Integrated to Modular
 

I can't find any information on the internet about switching over from an integrated to a modular course.

I have started my ATPL theory and sat some exams but I am now looking to change to become a modular student.
The criteria on doing ATPL exams is that you must be either a PPL Licence Holder or be an integrated student.
Since I will soon be neither of those things (as ab initio training starts with the theoretical exams, not flying), how will this affect the legality of my ATPL theoretical exams?

Any info/advice/experience on switching would be much appreciated!

Try to finish the ATPLs before leaving your integrated course, it will save you a whole lot of trouble.

Otherwise you'll have to obtain a PPL first (=go trough PPL theoretical + PPL Practical) before you can restart your ATPLs.
Which undoubtly will take a few months, meanwhile the period in which you will have to finish all of your ATPL exams will keep on ticking (max. 18 months counted from your first exam).
+ you'll have to find another groundschool (= paying again), which sucks if you've already paid your fees etc at the integrated school.

Some CAA's will even render your ATPL results invalid if you 'restart' your training program elsewhere, it is completely ridicilous but what can you do about it. Not all CAA's do this, so inform at your national CAA.

Have you already done some exams?

I have already started some ATPL exams and I am due to finish Groundschool with my current school as I have finished all of theory and just waiting for exam dates due to Covid delays.

I’ve heard mixed opinions on whether ATPL exams would supersede my PPL exams such that I wouldn’t need to do that theory as well.

With all due respect, a forum might not be the place to get your info from. Inform at your national CAA.

I can only speak for my national CAA's rules but I am pretty sure they're a direct copy+paste from the EASA part FCL and other relevant annexes.


Your ATPL(A) exams will supersede your PPL(A) exams if and only if you have succesfully completed all of your exams and thus posses an ATPL theoretical knowledge certificate.

If you change from an integrated to a modular flightschool, with incomplete ATPLs you will need to adhere to the modular student requirements. Effectively meaning that you will be required to posess a PPL license before you can finish your remaining ATPL subjects ---> your thusfar completed ATPL exams will not be counted towards your PPL theoretical knowledge certificate, you will still need to complete ALL PPL subjects as required for issueing your PPL license.

Hence my advice; stay at your current (integrated) school untill you've completed all of your ATPLs. If you revert to modular now and silently complete your exams while being administrated as a modular student without a ppl license, you will not comply with the modular requirements and your results might be rendered invalid by your CAA.

Don't take a risk

1. Inform at your national CAA.
2. If the above information applies, stay integrated or make sure you can finish both PPL + remaining ATPLs within the required 18 month timeframe.

Integrated to Modular
 

Hello guys,

I am an integrated ATPL student who recently finished ground school and is about to start VFR training. I should be finishing my MCC in a year, mabe less. The situation being what it is I am looking at options to weather the storm.

Does anyone know if it is possible to go from Integrated to modular? If so, how? I have all 14 ATPL theory modules validated but do not have a PPL, which is the first step of modular training.

You've done the hard bit. You can credit the ATPL exams downward for LAPL, PPL, CPL and IR. All you need to do is go and show those exams to a flight school, fly the hours and get the PPL.

Funny how everyone wants to go modular route nowadays

JiminyCricket

As long as you have completed all subjects and recieved a decleration from your CAA proving this (theoretical knowledge certificate) you will be fine.
Your ATPL theory will be credited towards your PPL, effectively meaning that you don't have to sit the PPL theoretical exams.

Thank you for the answers guys. I have individual resultsfor each subject but I will look into the certificate you mentioned.

You don't need one. The printout of your ATPL subject results will be sufficient to show the school, the PPL would be issued based on CAA records anyway.

Hey all, not wanting to start a new thread, found out that this would be the most appropriate one. I've spent quite a few time reading and scrolling through all the posts here and in other threads before registering to post this and came about some of the ideas I've already had in my mind. Nevertheless, some not so much so here it goes:

My story is just like many other stories you read here: childhood dream of becoming a pilot, etc, etc. Finding myself in my last year of High School, I've always imagined of going into an ATPL integrated next year (2021). However, things have changed quite a bit as you all know (some I imagine in the toughest way). For the past few months I've been considering enrolling through an university degree (grades are not a problem- here you need a certain average from your high school grades as well as nationwide exams to get into a certain course). There's always that bitter feeling of not starting the ATPL next year, but I do feel it is the best thing to do and, after all, 3 years of my life may sound too much now but it certainly won't when I flashback this time of my life later on when I'm older. With that said, I'd still like to somehow be involved with flying and the industry these next years and figured out getting a PPL may not be bad idea, as I can even hold my license before I am 18 which would only be December next year when I'm at university already and not with a lot of spare time. But here is where my questions arise:

- By getting a PPL now, would that not enable me from after university enrolling into an ATPL integraded since a part of it is already done? Or is it possible that schools may accomodate me?
- If the answer above is affirmative in the first case, will I automatically then be obliged to follow the modular route?
- Then, I've always had the interest of being connected with an airline through a cadet programe right from the beginning. By holding a PPL and that kind of previous aviation experience, would that put me aside comparing with those with no experience whom the airline may take from scratch? Basically, would I be prevented from getting into those cadet programmes that may exist again in a few years time?
- Finally, and I know this has been widely discussed here but the panorama may have changed now towards the future. In a few years time, and hypothetically given the fact that I've chosen the modular route, would I be disregarded in multiple airlines comparing with those who got straight out of an integrated course (not taking into account each one's backgrounds, solely the way they formed themselves towards an ATPL).

I do think this may be nice and I could enjoy myself by following this path, however I have these doubts which I think are part of the process.

Many thanks for reading until the end, hoping to get some answers/views on this.

here are some quick pointers:

1) the most important fact to take to mind: a flightschool is, unlike a university, a commercial business. They can decide to take you in as they see fit. PPL or not, highschool diploma or not, whatever.

2) the modular/integrated route has been widely discussed, please review some threads. But by using some simple mental gymnastics; imagine the following courses:

Course A: 120,000 payed up front, uniform, flightbag and rayban aviators included.

Course B: 60,000 pay as you go, no uniform included, 50 more flighthours, choose the airplanes you wish to fly, freedom to manage your own planning.

Course A and B are of equal quality and yield equal chances of obtaining a job.


What course would you choose?
And what if I called Course A ‘integrated’ and course B ‘modular’ which course would you choose?

Modular being inferior and unemployable is a meme created by integrated flightschools. I can’t blame you as you’re still new, but as you progress in the world or flightschools you’ll start to understand the integrated scam.

and regarding the airlines, nobody cares, modular and integrated students have been consistently hired in the past few years (bar some exceptions). If anything, you as a person (soft and hard skills) will be the biggest factor in being hired, not the name of a school on your resume.

BTW Don’t tunnelvision on a flight deck career, especially trough an integrated course. Imagine spending 120k on some phony integrated course. You’ll be 20ish years old, jobless and uneducated. How do you reckon to pay off your debts? It is a miserable outlook for someone who is just starting his adult life! Follow upon your plans of going to university, complete your PPL and take another ponder about commercial flying when the outlooks are better. 5 years seem like an eternity when you’re 17, but it is nothing and at that age +5 years will not reduce your chances of being hired due to old age :O

TTOscar

A really difficult time for aspiring aviators, and until vaccines are fully rolled out to ‘right the ship’, nothing much is going to change. That might take a while before the ripple effect cascades into aviation and increased demand for air travel with unfortunate increases in unemployment.

Go to University, obtain your quality degree, not necessarily aviation related, by which time you will be more mature, a definite quality required in aviation.
A T Snake provides sound advice.

The answer two above is often trotted out, but it isn’t really accurate.

Firstly, it isn’t a case of which method is cheaper since the modular is nearly always going to be cheaper. It was designed to be just that, At the end of the day you get the same licence and if you want to hold it aloft and show everybody then go the cheapest route every single time! I will sell you my bit of paper if you like, it comes with 25,000 hours attached and you can have it for a tenner! As a bit of paper it is worthless. I have the same driving licence as Lewis Hamilton but God knows I can’t get Mercedes Petronas to give me the time of day.

Secondly, “Cadet” doesn’t usually mean “low hour commercial pilot” It is normally a formal apprenticeship programme into Airline flying offered by specific airlines with such a programme. Most of those programmes require you to attend a full time course of approved (and integrated) training at recognised training establishments. That is where the cost differential arises. These schools are not “scams” but they are usually very expensive and as always there are no guarantees of seamless employment at the end of them even outside of a global industry crisis.

The idea that a fresh CPL holder is going to be just what airlines are looking for, is a fallacy. Airlines are usually looking for the best experience for the least cost. If you can find someone who’s experience enables you to have them producing revenue for the company in the shortest amount of time for the least input cost, then you have likely made a good business decision. Low hour pilots are very intensive on training costs and where cadet programmes are utilised that is offset by both an assurance as to the cadets training provenance (you real want to be familiar with their training heritage,) and the bulk of the training cost risk being placed on the candidate. Even then, the majority of successful applicants are likely to be pilots with good and relevant experience on their CV’s. Don't be hoodwinked into believing that it is a level playing field, because it isn’t. A typical 250 hour CPL holder is not what makes Airline recruiters eyes light up. Again, be sure to understand what is meant by the term “cadet.”

Over the last 40 years I have worked for 2 airlines with very strong cadet programmes. Nearly all of the successful applicants came through the recognised integrated training models. In the last decade, a significant proportion were MPL “cadets” and that is by its very nature a full time integrated course with further integration between the airline and the training school.

Having said that, and as you already appreciate, the air transport industry has been turned on its head. There are a lot of casualties in all walks of life but specifically in this one. For the last 9 months economies are on life support with eye watering sums of fiduciary money being pumped into keeping those same economies afloat. Paying down these borrowings is going to take a great deal longer than 9 months. If, back in February, without a pandemic there had been a global contraction of 10% to this industry, it would have sent its own shockwaves into the marketplace. Now a rebound (when it eventually comes) is likely to still result in a marketplace significantly weaker than just a 10% downturn. The question everybody wants to know is how long, and nobody can do other than speculate on the answer to that.

Ten years ago, one of my own children completed a full time course of integrated training and they have worked (now as a Captain) ever since graduating. Like everything, time results in evolution and you have to approach the market cautiously and realistically. My advice (and that is all it can ever be) is to keep your powder dry. By all means do a PPL and better yourself wherever the opportunity arises, but do not make any high risk investments without a much clearer vision of where the future market better lies.

Good luck!

African_TrouserSnake thank you very much for your inputs. Yes, I do agree that the years at university may sound like a pain now but in a few years time I'll look back and think it went by quite fast. Regarding the modular route, yes it has its own advantages too.

parkfell And one of the key issues I find is how we're going to be able to restore the public's confidence in flying and travelling. We shall see with time! Yes, I'm not not planning on undertaking something related with this industry. It'll be separate.

Bealzebub Thanks for the input. My doubt still lies on the following: these apprenticeship programmes you've mentioned. A few years back (they have been increasingly) you used to have airlines which sponsored you through a training route and then you would work for them. Aer Lingus, through their MPL, used to have that, as well as the Lufthansa Group with EFA at Bremen and BA's FPP a few years ago. My question is, if these type of programs ever return again in a few years, would they consider taking someone like me, holding a PPL licence?

Thank you all for your input. I shall be starting to look for schools in order to see what my options are to do the PPL.

Bealzebub

“Try to deflect the fact that you will get the same paper for triple the price by implying that a lesser cost directly correlates to a lessser quality and thus lesser piloting skills”
- The eternal flightschool salesman guide written by I.N. Tegrated

Let me offer you another perspective on your cheap implication by using the same rhetoric: You payed 10k for a drivers license while Hamilton payed 2k for his. Makes you look silly doesn’t it?

Modular being of lesser quality is a load of :mad:, you for one should know mr 25000. There are bad and good flightschools on both ends of the spectrum. Just imagine that a 50k modular fatpl still yields a profit to the flightschool, can’t even imagine what kind of profit 120k for an fatpl with lesser flighttime yields

Thank you for considering your reply for nearly a month Mr Trouser snake. The problem is that the licence doesn’t matter (a point you seem to have missed?) It is what you do with it. For many people it is a part of the necessary acquisition on the road to a career with airlines. In itself it isn’t the final hurdle. Unfortunately it is often projected and of course perceived as just that. There have long been “fast track” and invariably those were full time integrated routes, into airline apprenticeships. There have also been alternative “self improver” routes into airline careers. They often required jumping on “stepping stones” leading to the 2500-3000 hours that were traditionally required for those routes. When JAA brought in the 200/250 hour hour CPL, everybody and their dog thought it was the end game. Usually it wasn’t and this degenerated into the “modular/integrated” pseudo-argument that is so pervasive in this and similar threads. For those schools that were supplying the airline apprenticeship programmes the airline companies had to be satisfied with the output that then became their input.

There is no doubt at all in my mind that there are a great many excellent “modular” schools offering excellent programmes. However the basic CPL simply isn’t the golden ticket so many would hope it is as they use this “modular/integrated” argument to justify a determined pathway. I don’t care what it yields to the flight school, it is what it yields to the candidate. To that end I have indeed put my money where my mouth is and although the risk cannot be understated (as I have said for many years now) the result didn’t make me “ look silly” at all, indeed, far from it!

I have a similar number of hours to Bealzebub (if that's what 25000 means) and personally, I can't work out for the life of me why anyone would invest so much money and time in order to be an airline employee

Sorry I am not retired, so I do not have time to lurk on this board every hour of the day. I thank you for the history lesson, but fail to see its relevance tbh.

ofcourse these threads degenerate into modular vs integrated, which is due to the big boy flightschools argument that modular is a qualitative lesser form of training. Besides that flight schools (especially the integrated ones) offer the perspective of a 150h fatpl being the endgame, TR and an airline career is next. The argument is more than logic on a wannabe forum, as wannabes don’t have much info to go by...