Our flight has been postponed two or three weeks due to family honey-do-list. Not to worry though. The Sierras aren’t going anywhere.

And I won’t mention the flight in church.

quote:

Originally posted by Russ59:

And I won’t mention the flight in church.

I agree with the previous suggestions made, as well as the legalities discussed.

When I was in high school and started flying and joined an airshow, one of the pilots used to pick me up when the school day ended, drive me out to the airfield, and we would spend several hours washing and waxing one of his planes. Then (no prior arrangement), with an hour or so of daylight left, he'd take me up in his other plane and let me fly around, fly over my house to wave at my family, and let me go chase local cows.

Just a suggestion, but in lieu of payment, maybe you could volunteer to help wash and wax the plane. Maybe not the easiest job, but I can think of a lot worse ways to spend a few hours then hanging out a local airport. Can be a good way to introduce kids to aviation, but it does require supervision as there are some do's and don'ts...not to mention some sharp things on planes to be careful of.

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:

Just a suggestion, but in lieu of payment, maybe you could volunteer to help wash and wax the plane. Maybe not the easiest job, but I can think of a lot worse ways to spend a few hours then hanging out a local airport. Can be a good way to introduce kids to aviation, but it does require supervision as there are some do's and don'ts...not to mention some sharp things on planes to be careful of.

Wow, you guys just keep wanting to kill this guy in the eyes of the FAA. There is no "in lieu of payment", there is no gift of wine, there is no take you out to dinner. There can be absolutely no quid pro quo when it comes to compensation. ANYTHING that looks like compensation will be looked at unfavorably.

Guppy has the patience to spell it all out, I can't type that well, but he nailed it in his post. You never know where the tattletale will come from, and 135 operators are on the lookout for this very reason. You never know who has a sight seeing tour, who doesn't know you are friends, who overhears something that raises his hackles. A kid who says to his friends in passing "man all I had to do was wash and wax the plane and then he took us for plane ride over the mountains". It seems very innocuous, and it's only dinner or whatever, but there has been much case law of the FAA making an example out of these types of deals.
The odds of running afoul are pretty low, but they are never zero, and you never know who is listening or where.

quote:

Originally posted by jeffxjet:

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:

Just a suggestion, but in lieu of payment, maybe you could volunteer to help wash and wax the plane. Maybe not the easiest job, but I can think of a lot worse ways to spend a few hours then hanging out a local airport. Can be a good way to introduce kids to aviation, but it does require supervision as there are some do's and don'ts...not to mention some sharp things on planes to be careful of.

Wow, you guys just keep wanting to kill this guy in the eyes of the FAA. There is no "in lieu of payment", there is no gift of wine, there is no take you out to dinner. There can be absolutely no quid pro quo when it comes to compensation. ANYTHING that looks like compensation will be looked at unfavorably.

Guppy has the patience to spell it all out, I can't type that well, but he nailed it in his post. You never know where the tattletale will come from, and 135 operators are on the lookout for this very reason. You never know who has a sight seeing tour, who doesn't know you are friends, who overhears something that raises his hackles. A kid who says to his friends in passing "man all I had to do was wash and wax the plane and then he took us for plane ride over the mountains". It seems very innocuous, and it's only dinner or whatever, but there has been much case law of the FAA making an example out of these types of deals.
The odds of running afoul are pretty low, but they are never zero, and you never know who is listening or where.

Notice my use of the word "volunteer". Not a payment, not an exchange of services, a favor, a gesture as a token of gratitude.

I'm curious, what FAA regulation stipulates the monetary value of a plane washing and waxing?

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
I'm curious, what FAA regulation stipulates the monetary value of a plane washing and waxing?

14 CFR 61.113(a) which stipulates that a private pilot may not fly for compensation or hire (with narrow exception).

14 CFR 61.113(c) which stipulates that a private pilot must not pay less than his pro rata share of the direct operating costs of the flight.

14 CFR 61.113(e) which limits reimbursement to fuel, oil, airport expenditures, and rental fees, making any other form of compensation, disallowed.

Numerous legal interpretations which have consistently cited any form of compensation, to include the logging of flight time, for the past 30 + years.

For starters. The actual cost or monetary value of the wash job? Irrelevant.

I paid for airplane rental when learning to fly as a kid by cycling 30 miles after school to wash and wax in a freezing hangar, and paid instructors by working for them or their mothers, and taking every job I could find to scrounge change. Legal.

Being a private pilot alters that dynamic. If a private pilot wishes compensation, he or she needs to obtain commercial certification and act within the scope of an operation that allows them to do so.

As noted previously and cited by Chief Legal Counsel interpretations (which define the regulation and it's application), Compensation does not require profit, profit motive, or actual payment of funds, and 14 CFR 113 specifically prohibits compensation.

Yes, I'm aware of those regulations. But my suggestion is not a quid pro quo transaction. A simple act of volunteering to help wash and wax an airplane to say thank you for a free ride. Two separate actions with no prerequisites or prearranged agreements.

Hell, if the pilot is that concerned about a simple gesture of gratitude he can pay a nickel for the wash and wax and buy everyone an ice cream cone.

Again, ompensation does not require profit, profit motive, or actual payment of funds.

It doesn't matter that it's a nice gesture, or that it wasn't prearranged, or or that no money changed hands. It's not relevant. Those are defensive arguments one could unsuccessfully attempt to make, but the FAA's position has been spelled out in detail on this subject for a long time, and every imaginable way to get around it has been tried.

Also unsuccessfully.

Well, lest some pilot get his Karen-like feathers ruffled and feel compelled to do his duty and call out the FAA hounds, I'll forgo the details, and will simply state that I'm familiar with an aviation operation that has been duly and regularly visited and certified by various FAA inspectors, including a notable FAA manager who once spoke publicly to issue a lifetime achievement award to one particular pilot...all while the various activities discussed here regularly occurred for years.

How the f is Karen going to find out.

Read the thread.

quote:

Originally posted by Krazeehorse:
How the f is Karen going to find out.

Because legitimate commercial operators-sight seeing flights, banner towers, instructors, charter operators, cargo operators are ALWAYS looking for people flouting the rules for compensation. It takes a shit ton of money and training to do this legally, and there are always people looking to save a buck and cut corners. It is the duty of legal operators to spot and report anyone who is cutting corners. If you don't, literal lives are at stake. The FAA has a reporting website that Guppy inked to if you wanna check it out.
People are listening when you talk in the fbo, they are checking flight aware to see where you go. WHy is that plane taking off and going to the same location at the same time every day? Why is that plane dirty(drug running)? True story--my father in law has an antique airplane. As such he is exempt from the rules that say his N numbers must be 12' high. His numbers only have to be 2 in high, and since he likes the aesthetics of it, that's what he has. Someone reported him to the FAA and the DEA as a suspected drug runner because 2 in numbers are harder to spot from the ground. You never know who is watching, and these days of ADSB and flight aware, it's everyone.

As eluded to above, money doesn't even have to change hands for the FAA to get mad. Getting flight time is expensive and many operators will exploit that and "allow" the pilot to log flight time for free in exchange for flying the plane. The act of giving flight time is considered compensation. There have been numerous crashes and lives lost over this issue, that's why it's such a big deal to the feds.
Granted this is probably a one time thing, and it's actually on the up and up and the FAA will probably never find out about it, BUT it's one of those things where a small slip of the tongue could lead to an investigation from the FAA. And that's something no one wants.
The whole point is that there are a lot of regulations at play here that the layman don't know about, and inadvertently violating one could be disastrous. And you wont know you've violated it until it's too late. If you want, offer to pay up to half the operating expenses, but beware of going over half or giving gifts.

quote:

Originally posted by Modern Day Savage:
Well, lest some pilot get his Karen-like feathers ruffled and feel compelled to do his duty and call out the FAA hounds, I'll forgo the details, and will simply state that I'm familiar with an aviation operation that has been duly and regularly visited and certified by various FAA inspectors, including a notable FAA manager who once spoke publicly to issue a lifetime achievement award to one particular pilot...all while the various activities discussed here regularly occurred for years.

It's like everything in life, it's fine until it isn't. And you never know when it isn't. The OP asked and we provided the other side of the coin as to how a simple act of appreciation could be misconstrued by the FAA. You never know what the inspector at his FSDO is like, if this particular flight is the first to catch the FAA's radar or the 12th that day.

We have our own inspector dedicated to our operation, and sometimes he will spend an entire day ramp checking EVERY single one of our flights at a particular airport. If you're his 12th crew member to be inspected, you better be on point because his patience for the same error 12 times over is thin.

Damn, think I'll clip this on my pocket and go to the local aerodrome, walk around and watch everyone crap their drawers.