Sticky situation
 

Person ''A'' had decided upon realising his dreams of a career in aviation. After years of careful deliberation, he reached a decission. Along with many other recomendations, the course he chose, was also highly regarded with two of his friends who were both current students.

''A'' would undergo a selection process at Firm ''B'', which was purely a selection/placement firm, which provided selection services for 2 FTO's; ''C'' and ''D'', as well as a MCC and Jet-Familiarisation course after the completed studies at either FTO.

''A'' passed the selection at the firm, making him capable of enroliing in the FTO of his choice. After reviewing the offer of FTO ''D'', he decided to rather choose ''C'', mainly because of its name and reputation. Up to this point ''A'' had no flight training, except for a few pleasure flights in SEP acft. Upon being accepted into the roster of Firm ''B'', he expressed his concerns regarding his height. At 202cm / 6ft7, he was among the taller of the cadets, and had concernes about fitting into the fleet the FTO operated, as he had never been in one. After hearing his concerns, the staff at Firm ''B'', reasured him, that there was absolutely no problem with fitting into the acft, and that all his concerns were not needed.

Time passed, the contract was signed. A very unbalanced contract. If the student would have ceassed the training for ANY reason, with the exception of serious injury and death, he would have to pay a loss of profit fee of 10,000gbp. He would also have to stick to stringent rules about passing exams with high averages and so forth.

Person ''A'' was finally on the verge of fulfilling his dreams. He embarked to the FTO with his classmates from Firm ''B'' and was molded into a class at the FTO.

During the second lesson of groundschool, ''A'' was approached by the chief groundschool instructor, who had concerns about his height. They proceeded to make a fit check and discovered that there was no way ''A'' could fly the plane, and as such, complete the training.

''A'' called the ceo of Firm ''B'' and demanded that the contract be anulled. This was done and the first fee of 45,000eur was transfered back to him. ''A'' returned home. He was too late to enroll in any university at home in the running year, by not being a member of one, lost his medical insurance and the chance of getting any part time employement.

Firm ''B'' offered, as a compensation, a place in the programme at the FTO, which ''A'' had already rejected.


I'm very interested in reading what your take on the situation is.

I don't understand the problem?, you joined a flight school, paid and didn't fit in the aircraft so they gave you a refund, you have now been offered a place at another school, presumably with different aircraft, what is the issue?

Maybe he's confused by all the letters - I know I was!

Always go with C or the longest answer ..... not sure how much it applies here but all those letters brought the ground school revision flooding back.

Would I be correct in saying that you are apprehensive of a career in aviation? Something in the tone of what you said gave me that impression. Now, you're out of the original FTO with only the option to go to another FTO and you can't decide now to go to uni or do courses as they're application dates are gone now?

If that were me I'd use the year constructively and enrole next year. As much as it sucks, it was an experience. You gave it a shot and it didn't work out as planned. Get up, shake off the dirt and get on with it... No point in hanging around....

My advice:

a. estimate the total cost to atpl
b. add 10-15%
c. divide this figure by the number of hours you'll have at atpl point.

This, d. is the hourly rate for the course. If you like and can afford d, proceed. Assume your career ends there.

CG

My ''integrated'' experience was cut short by negligence on the side of the selection agency. It was on their professional assesment and opinion that I based my decision to enroll with them, and I was willing to abide the very stringent contract. Now that they have blatantly breached said contract, I am to see no compensation, similar to that I would have to pay them if the roles were reversed. With a letter admiting to telling me that no problems would occur in hand, I'm unsatisfied, as they claim that such an event could not have been forseen, and falls into the category of force majeur. I strongly disagree; it is true that they did not have the forsight, but I had, which was why I asked. And they said that no problems could occur and blah blah blah.
Bottom line is that they admited to their mistake, in writting, and they feel offering me a place in a lesser programme is a suitable form of compensation.

I am not apprehensive, not in the least, of a carreer in aviation, as soon as I arrived home, I started a PPL course, which I am a few hours away from completing, and am looking for a groundschool in the area, to start the ATPL course.

This event hasn't exactly slowed me down, I am just under the impression that I am being treated unfairly, and am considering taking legal action.

Chalk it up to experience, i'm 6'5" and before I did any flight training I went to a school to see how I fitted and how comfortable I would be in different aircraft, I would say that me being well over 'average' height and you being more so that its our responsibility not the schools to check these things.

I knew I had no problems in Cessnas, and I told them that, but they told me that they had taller students, and that there is no way there would be a problem. I thought of checking it myself before I was reassured, I mean I had no previous experience, and they dealed with aircrews and training and FTO's on a daily basis.

Go for it then, but I think you will struggle with legal action, you admit that you had foresight and they didn't, you admit the contract was unbalanced but still signed it, the contract stated that unless you ceased training for serious injury or death you would lose £10,000, you didn't but they still gave you it back.

It's quite possible that they have had students as tall as you and you said you have no problem with Cessna's, I'm a little shorter than you but couldn't use the 150 and 152 Cessna's, I could fit in but struggled more with the width and the weight.

Put it another way, if you went and bought a car off a dealer who deals with drivers all the time and you bought the car but couldn't fit in it, who would you think was responsible?

I think you may be labouring under the false impression that somehow one of these bodies owes you something? All FTO's are there to make money, that is pretty much where the story ends. Hence the unbalanced contract etc. etc.

In some ways though maybe you have had a lucky escape from paying a lot of money with little hope of employment at the moment....

Instead of wasting your energy, time and money on something negative, get on with your life, and start concentrating about your ATPL's. :mad:

Don't think the courts will agree with you that you are due compensation, so if it was me I'd chalk it up to experience.

One training school that will be able to accommodate you is Bristol Aviation. Their sales director Steve Moore is 6ft 9" and managed to train using their aircraft. They don't offer integrated training courses however.