Concerned parent... mortgage sized training fees
 

I'm not from this industry at all though I do enjoy reading some of the posts about life in the air.

About a year ago, I heard from my neighbour about how their son was about to embark of flying training which would see him spending time in Coventry before going out to Jordan (I think...) for further training. Eventually to end up with a commercial airline pilot's licence. My jaw dropped when they told me that they were funding the £80,000 ish cost of the course.

That was interesting as a story about our neighbour and therefore not our problem. Until our son called us last night to tell us that he was seriously thinking about doing the same. There's some sort of open day in Southampton in November... Costs could be funded via special loans payable back over 10 years. This is on top of the student loan by the way. Further training is done in New Zealand which sounds very nice. There's another course somewhere else where the practical training is done in Arizona. And so on...

I'll be honest and say I know nothing about these courses and whether they amount to a genuine way into becoming a pilot with a good prospect of a very well paid career. My instinct is telling me that these places are tempting young people with the glamour of flying coupled with spending time in glamorous sounding places at a cost of loadsamoney... It sounds vaguely scammish to me ? I'm sure I'm wrong but would anyone be kind enough to explain more please ?

Concerned parent... mortgage sized training fees
 

Sometimes training overseas can actually be cheaper.

For example, fuel costs in the US are significantly cheaper than fuel in the UK, and this saving is reflected in the cost of aircraft hire.

There is however the cost of living in another place instead of home to take into consideration.

These courses require a lot of research before embarking on one particular route. When I made my training, I stayed in the UK, with a ground school north of London and a flight training center 30 minutes away by car. This was the best solution for me as I already had flight hours, and the schools "felt" right to me.

Having said that, a large proportion of my colleagues have made some or all of their training in Florida or other areas of the US. They had a good time, learned a lot, and saw more of the world during their training.

Aviation is expensive, and none of these am schools can guarantee work with an airline: - any of them that claim so are lying.

I hope that gives a little insight at least!

Training costs are high, you are right to be careful but to be fair there are "non-scammish" :ooh: schools out there.

I would however caution against assuming he's automatically going to head into "a very well paid career".

£80k would be what's called an "Integrated" course, referred to colloquially as "zero to hero", and they do what it says on the tin - qualify somebody with no flying experience to (bar a type rating) slide into the first officer's seat in an airliner, taking around 18 months to do so.

There's an alternative self-managed route known as "Modular" which will cost a little over half that, probably take nearer 30 months, and leave the person - in theory at least - with the same licences and employment chances.

Neither is a scam, both are what they cost. However, there are and always will be a few schools best avoided. One integrated school called Cabair went bust a year or so back and left a great many students high and dry, and massively in debt.

The "Integrated versus Modular" debate is contentious and never ending. I'm not going to offer my own opinions of the differences in this thread, but will just say look on this any many other forums and you'll find much informed (and uninformed) debate on the subject.


I will offer one strong opinion however. If your son has not done any significant flying, and hasn't had a medical exam, he doesn't know:-

(1) If he can pass the class 1 (airline pilot standard) medical
(2) If he has any aptitude for flying
(3) If he enjoys flying.

Without "Yes" to all three, spending £80k, or £40k would be a really unwise investment.

So my strong advice is that he should be persuaded, with or without your financial support but certainly with your moral support, to do a PPL or Private Pilots Licence, as well as class 1 medical first and before making any commitment to anything else in the way of flying training.


My other equally strong advice is that any flying training should be paid for "as he goes" and never be in credit to the school by more than a few thousand pounds at a time, and ideally not at-all. That said, I'd guess that the scheme your son is looking at is the CTC wings one - as you described it is fairly accurate and they do seem, right now, to be one of the more sensible integrated providers, with a scheme which essentially creates a position of indentured labour for a period of time. Details here: Training | CTC Wings ; it is a particular model that has worked for a lot of people, however uncomfortable it looks.

There is a sticky thread at the top of the forum which is a bit of a hamster wheel about the pro's and cons of the two main ways to become a civilian pilot.

http://www.pprune.org/professional-p...ew-thread.html

There are those of us that are dead against taking such risks with the family assets. And those who say its acceptable because it is the only way to get into flying big jets quickly.

Its not just 80k there are other costs on top of that. They may also have to find 30k for a type rating as well. But there are cheaper ways to get the license. The training and being trained is in some ways the easy part. The getting the first job is the biggest hurdle.

I won't start down the line of selling you one way or the other as it is all covered in the thread I have linked to. Unfortunately you will have to wade through that thread and see who's opinion rings true for you and your family.

But remember they are only opinions based on previous history and what people can see from there own niche of the industry currently. 12 months is a long time in aviation and 24 months a life time away.

The decision is a gamble what ever you choose. The pro's and cons are all covered in that thread multiple times.

And to add the advice to go and get a class one medical at Gatwick is extremely good there is no point even looking at all the options if your son can't get that first hurdle. There have been many many wannabie pilots that's as far as they get.

Initial Class 1 (Professional Pilot) Medical Examination | Medical | Personal Licences and Training

The headline figure is £80-100K. Some of the variables have already been highlighted but unfortunately this is an industry which recognises there are enough people (eejits?) who will pay silly amounts of money to get a chance at flying an airline.

My main point is that there are NO GUARANTEES. Sure, some schools have half a foot in the door with the airlines but the reality is that it is easy for individuals to fall by the wayside. There is a never-ending argument about integrated vs modular (worth reading, especially if you suffer from insomnia) and each route has advantages. The bottom line is that you need to accept that you may spend £80K and walk away with nothing other than a fancy bit of paper saying "Licence". Of course, the system does work and there are many people who spend the money, get a job and recover their investment.

I work in the flying training industry and see pilots who get jobs and others who don't having completed the same, expensive training. One other thing, our industry survives on selling flight training and some companies are very good with their sales pitch. Just remember there are NO GUARANTEES.

PS. Never pay anything up front that you can't afford to lose.

Come on boys this will just end up the same way as all the rest have gone.

The guy needs to

1. Take his lad to a flight school for a trial flight to actually see if he likes it.

2. If he does get a class 1 medical sorted out.

3. Then decided what the plan of attack is.

It is probably worthwhile visiting the Flyer Professional Flight exhibition on the 26 October - 2013 LONDON PROFESSIONAL FLIGHT TRAINING EXHIBITION. It is held twice a year at the Sofitel hotel at Heathrow and lasts from 1000 to 1700.

Most (but not all) Approved Training Organisations (ATOs) will be there, both those providing integrated training and those providing modular training. There are also a number of seminars which you and your son can attend.

It is an ideal opportunity to learn more about what flying training entails.


Note to moderators: This is not an advertising post - I have no links to Flyer at all (although the ATO I run will have a stand at the exhibition)

To assist in your research, I suggest that you and your son visit the Professional Flight Training Exhibition at Heathrow T5 on 26 October.

Many of the leading flight training organisations will be present to offer advice concerning what training routes are available towards becoming a commercial pilot. Caveat emptor applies !

There are no fully-sponsored training courses available currently, where an airline pays for a pre-selected cadet's training, but there are occasionally 'mentored' training courses offered by airlines partnering with a flying school. These include pre-selection of the cadet prior to entering training, which is generally a good indicator that the cadet has the requisite skills to pass training and become a capable airline pilot. And while these courses don't tend to include financial assistance to cover training fees, they are the nearest thing available to a guarantee of employment on graduation - although this will be dependent on industry conditions at the time of graduation so, again, caveat emptor.

The most common of these airline mentored courses is now the Multi-Crew Pilot Licence (MPL) and I recommend that you and your son conduct some research into the licence. Take into account however that competition for a place on these schemes is fierce and so your son will need to be able to demonstrate that he is exactly the right sort of person that an airline is looking to employ as a pilot, and thorough research will stand you in good stead as to what skills/attributes your son should be looking to develop before applying.

Good luck !

Edited to say that Linda beat me to it !

And if any school tells you there is going to be a pilot shortage soon walk away from them.

There will never be a low hours pilot shortage. Experienced crew with additional quals such as training Captain or TRI/TRE there might be.

Our school will also be at Heathrow. My only tip is to talk to as man\y schools as possible and try to scratch beneath the surface.

There is already a significant shortage of experienced pilots. Chinese airlines are paying contract captains upwards of $270,000 per annum currently.

An alarming statistic came from ICAO Secretary General Raymond Benjamin in Jan at the ASEAN Aviation Training & Education Summit in Jarkata, that 30% of the total aviation workforce will retire between 2013 & 2014, something which John Allen from the FAA said was "astounding and dramatic" and that "we don't have a system to address the issue."

A sobering thought !

Not really for just starting pilot in there career.

the main problem with China is that they really don't want western crews over there and that there is a conflict of interest between the aviation groups which control things. One side wants them and the other doesn't

There is a huge failure rate of medicals as the westerners don't fit Chinese body profiles. And even if you do get in the door if a local looses face you will be out the door in a second.

That's across all jobs related, the pilot side of things have been churning out pilots if we needed them or not for years. There will never be a shortage of qualified 200 hour without a type rating pilots in the EU.

Well maybe yes maybe no.

But as your obviously a regular poster who has registered with a new login. Who maybe doesn't like the way the thread is going. Which for once is relatively balanced

I think people would be surprised how many parents do actually come into the forum when researching what thier children are getting themselves into.

We are never ever going to change the minds of 17-25 year olds who have been sold anything through the marketing.

But we can give a broad range of opinions to the parents so that they can make a decision of the risk to the family's capital. Yes this will mean loads of kids won't get what they want. And more than likely a lot of this age group wish that a lot of us who are flying would just go away and not post negative things about the job and the various methods of training.

But such is life.

This OP is definitely the genuine article :) guys. Thank you all for your replies which as Jock said were very balanced. I'm sorry for being slow to acknowledge.
Your initial thoughts have been very helpful.

26th October sounds like a good event to go to but a bit short notice. It's a twice yearly event so I guess there might be another one in the spring ?

"There's a shortage of pilots" is something my neighbours son told me too. Not too dissimilar to the line put out by Schools of Plumbing a few years ago as people were seduced by the high rates that they were charging at the time. We will treat this with caution.

I was chatting to my hairdresser about this yesterday expecting a bit of tea and sympathy. What I got in return was a story about a son of a friend of hers who had undergone this training (paid for by loan..) and is doing well as a BA pilot. More balance...

We need to engage with our son as he goes through his research and decision making. Your replies have helped to get me started.

tdubya, they also do shows in Leeds and Dublin.

The shortage of pilots thing is all linked to a Boeing report issued a few years back and just reissued. A search on here will give you the workers in the industry view on its claims.

It was a stock market report for projected sales.

There are some sides of it that do hold an element of truth. The engineering side of things with getting fresh meat into the industry has been neglected for years and the age range is quite top heavy.

But for the pilot training side of things its been latched onto as the number one marketing fact for selling the courses. They have even got the report in through a back door in a training provider conference that's linked to ICAO which is the United Nations body which deals with global standards. So now they try and claim it is an ICAO position that there is going to be a shortage.

The pilot side of things supply has consistently out stripped demand for the last 20-30 years.

If your lad can get on one of the schemes which pre selects and then provides an almost guaranteed (nothing is ever guaranteed though) job afterwards that is about as low risk as it gets these days. But even then things may go wrong if the economy takes a dip or some other calamity occurs. Which is what your hairdressers friends lad managed to get into.

I think for BA there was initially over 15,000 applicants and out of that about 1500-2000 actually went through the selection and in the end about 100 were placed in the mentored training process. So its a pretty exclusive club to get into.

Have fun with your lad as I suspect he has already been bought in by the school marketing and what his peers have told him. And I know what a bugger I was at that age when I thought I knew something was correct.

If you want some sport at these shows they will normally have a few token youngsters in pilot uniform at the big stands. Start asking them questions about there take home pay, how much debt they have, what there monthly repayments are. And finally how many pilots they know that they trained with that are still looking for work.

Very quickly they will drop eye contact, clam up, look for escape and one of the school people will take over. Read into that what you will.

tdubya welcome to pprune, you've come to the right place to do your research if nothing else.

I suggest if you're looking at funding your guy to the tune of "mortgage sized" amounts of money, you spend quite a few hours reading over this website and read as many of the tales of triumph and tales of woe as you possibly can, to get an idea of the true state of the industry. Do check people's post histories though, there are a few folk on this forum who masquerade as something they're not, in order to push their own particular training scheme :ouch:

It's very important that you understand that this "£80 to £100K" thing is only the start, it gets you the licence but it certainly doesn't guarantee anything at the end. It is the cost of buying the lottery ticket if you will ... you aren't going to win anything without it, but once you have it you still have to hope your numbers come up! And like most lotteries, many many people who've spent all their money walk away disappointed. For every genuine pilot job at the entry level, there are hundreds of qualified candidates chasing it.

By all means attend as many flight training exhibitions as possible but always keep in the back of your mind, the ONE thing that everyone exhibiting in that place has in common, is their desire to relieve you of that mortgage-sized sum of money. You won't hear much in the way of balanced views of industry prospects in there.

For what it's worth, I have 8,000ish hours and currently flying airbuses out in the far east on a contract job, been flying for 20 years, not that means anything but if there's one thing i CAN tell you with absolute conviction - if anyone you speak to uses "airline growth in Asia" as a justification for westerners going and learning to fly, walk away because they don't have a clue what they are talking about. YES there's a shortage of highly experienced captains in China / Asia. There's a number of reasons for that, but it's not to do with an overall shortage of pilots - it's mainly to do with the fact that myself and most of my highly experienced colleagues will not touch China with a 40 foot pole, due to concerns about safety, lifestyle and dishonest employment practice. There are very few expat co-pilots out here, (and none on the Chinese mainland), the Chinese are cranking out many many hundreds of their own cadet pilots every year.

All the best and feel free to ask any questions you may have :ok:

ps mad-jock's words are wise, heed them well.

I'm sure you were told that, but it sounds incredibly unlikely. Plus your post belongs in the modular .v. integrated thread I think.

I heard that the forthcoming 'shortage' will be, for the most part, a consequence of the European Working Time Directive? The increase of the Airline Pilots retirement age from 55 to 65? Just a thought. :confused: