How much ground time should I be charged? (CFIs enter please)

I don't charge students for blocks like that, and I rarely charge them for ground time - unless we are actively engaged in something that would obviously be billable time to anyone. I much prefer charging a fair price per hour, and not make a student feel like they are being nickel and dimed.

Next time, just tell your instructor when the tab is being tallied that you timed .4 ground and 1.2 flight - I bet that it will never be an issue again.

If you think they are otherwise a good teacher, slip them a few bucks under the table. That will more than make it up to them
 
drunkenbeagle said:
Um, I always do... Cost of doing business and not ending up dead.
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I'm not saying an instructor isn't going to look at an aircraft before he flies it. Perhaps I misunderstood what the OP was inferring, which I why I asked it in a question form.

From what I gather reading posts from you in the past you are a freelance instructor.

Why wouldn't you charge for ground time? If someone says "I need you from 1030 until 1230" during that time the student expects you to be there and they should pay for you to be there. If you are charged for more than 2 hours thats one thing but if you aren't getting paid for your time, you aren't a professional, you are a charity organization.(please don't take this as me calling you unprofessional that's not what I'm saying)

Now if you have a 3 hour block and an hour of that is spent at the cross country destination restaurant then that would be not billed, but I sure as heck would bill for the other 2 hours.
 
We had a guy at my old school who would at the end of every lesson say, "We'll let's go up to my office real quick and debrief. Ok...So....Better landings today. Ok? Now, what did we fly? 1.8? Ok and .2 for the debrief."

That's just not freakin right. An arbitrary .2 adds up after every lesson.
 
Freelance CFI. Two hours out of my day cost 2 hours of my time at a flat hourly rate. If we are only meeting for ground then I charge a ground rate.

I work for you during those two hours no matter what.

Also, if I get caught up talking to you for an extra 30 minutes of debrief then thats on me and is considered complementary because I want to see my students do good before I take any money.
 
flyinguitar said:
Oh, and one more thing - your instructor should definitely be helping you make your preflight as efficient as possible, including having it done and the plane all ready before you're scheduled with the instructor whenever possible. However, in my experience, the unpredictable nature of flight school operations (when the previous student gets back, switching planes for maintenance, weather, etc.) prevented this from happening most of the time. It's definitely an ideal to strive for, however.
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Are you suggesting the instructor should complete the student's preflight inspection? I disagree with that. The preflight portion is an important part of the training. Building that habit is key to becoming a good, safe pilot. I showed my students how to preflight, and it was theirs from then on. I did my own after they finished, just in case. (After my first aborted takeoff due to an pitot cover, I adopted that procedure.)
 
Pachong said:
We had a guy at my old school who would at the end of every lesson say, "We'll let's go up to my office real quick and debrief. Ok...So....Better landings today. Ok? Now, what did we fly? 1.8? Ok and .2 for the debrief."

That's just not freakin right. An arbitrary .2 adds up after every lesson.
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I had a guy start out being very fair about debriefing while we were putting up the airplane. I bought him a couple lunches as a thanks, then he started wanting to go do the same thing you mentioned after he sat in the airplane staring out the window for 15 minutes. One of the days I spoke up and said, "How bout you talk to me." Kind of surprised he responded, "About what?"
"How about flying?"
He tried to "debrief" me one more time and I just told him I was ready to go. Guess he was getting short on funds but I'm not made of money either.

My regular instructor gives me breaks and I give him breaks, I think it works out for both of us but experiences will vary from person to person I guess.
 
I charge as close to exactly the amount of time spent in the pre- and post-flight briefs as possible. If I'm teaching the student to preflight, I charge for preflight. Further along, I just meet them at the plane with preflight completed.

If I mix de-brief with grabbing lunch or chatting with them, then I try to be fair and charge only the actual time I spent delivering instruction.

The confounding factor is a flight school situation. When I was first learning to fly, I ended up at a scumbag operation in my hometown ("Sowell Aviation", where you're treated So Well...). I was a bright-eyed 16 year old, convinced that people in aviation would be people with integrity and honor, like myself. Hoo boy, was that a mistake. Fortunately, I eventually realized my mistake and went "across the road" at the airport (KPFN) to finish at the "other" FBO on the field ("Panama AvJet", which was actually a great place).

The first place did the "money on account" game, and hit me with all sorts of phantom charges. Bad news. I was being charged ground instruction for time when my instructor wasn't even interacting with me or there because of me... and he wasn't getting paid anywhere near what I was paying. He may not have been getting paid anything but a really terrible salary.

IMO, part 61 flight instruction is a natural fit for independent contract ... and part 141 schools shouldn't charge per hour unless the student is taking excess time. Anything between those two extremes seems to only work out for the business.

-Fox
 
I don't think being charged for the entire block of time is out of line, if the instructor is actually providing a service during that time.

Once-upon-another-life, I was a contract instructor at a small part 61 FBO. I decided early on that I would charge the same rate for ground or flight instruction, and charge my students (generally) based on the time that was reserved on the schedule. The time that a student reserved me was time that I could not bill to another student. As long as we had a good airplane and good weather, they were on the hook for the scheduled time. If they cancelled on short notice and I couldn't rebook someone in their place, I charged them for my time. Thankfully that didn't happen very often, partially because my students knew that I placed a high value on my time, so in turn, they did as well. I made it crystal clear to all new students what my billing policies were so there was no confusion later. I'm sure I lost a few students because of it, but I gained a number of others who knew that I would value their time, and provide value to them.

Now, in order to charge the rate I did I knew that it was critical that the students knew they were my customer. My job, and ONLY job during the usual 2 hour block was to make sure I was 100% focused on teaching and providing value. Of course there were exceptions to the rule and if weather/mtx etc., but for the most part, it worked very well for all involved.
 
PhilosopherPilot said:
Are you suggesting the instructor should complete the student's preflight inspection? I disagree with that. The preflight portion is an important part of the training. Building that habit is key to becoming a good, safe pilot. I showed my students how to preflight, and it was theirs from then on. I did my own after they finished, just in case. (After my first aborted takeoff due to an pitot cover, I adopted that procedure.)
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hcaeborev said:
Just so I'm sure you are saying that the instructor should preflight the aircraft for a student PRIOR to the student showing up?

Also this action should be unpaid?
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NO! That's not what I meant! Sorry for being unclear. I meant that the instructor should be encouraging the student to do the preflight before the blocked time whenever possible. The preflight is definitely the student's responsibility.
 
Boyington said:
We used the taxi, flying to the practice area, and other such time to talk about the lessons. I paid the instructor hobbs time, and that was about it.
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That's the wrong time to talk about the lesson.

When I instructed, you get charged ground time whenever we're discussing the lesson, or anything related to it. If you showed up well prepared, you'd probably only get hit for .3 during a standard lesson. If we were doing XC stuff, expect up to .5 or more of ground. If you didn't show up prepared, basically the entire time that we're not in the air (minus bathroom breaks) are being billed.

I never understood CFI's being afraid to charge ground. I used to work with a guy who actually got upset at me and lectured me about overcharging students, because he never charged ground time for his students. Well, 'good for you' was basically my response. We're teaching people how to fly airplanes! It's not a game, and the stuff I'm teaching you, and charging you for is because I want to see you alive at the end of the day when you no longer need me to sit next to you in the airplane. It's crazy that people get upset at this.
 
Mark815 said:
I never understood CFI's being afraid to charge ground.
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Agreed. No other profession seems to have an issue billing for time. Your plumber will charge you a call out fee just to show up, without doing anything or spending a minute on your pipes. See if an HVAC guy treats you any differently. God forbid you need a lawyer, he or she will bill you for the drive to work and the five minutes they spent thinking about your case over a cup of coffee last Saturday.

But when it comes to flight instruction all of a sudden you're supposed to feel bad about charging for your time. You've got a lot more money tied up in your training than the plumber, the consequences of poor work are greater, charge for the entire block. The flip side is you should be spending he entire block of time with the student, not like the op's instructor helping others do whatever.
 
I don't think there is a "norm." It's about agreement between CFI and student on what is fair. "Fair" can mean Hobbs time. It can mean "handshake-to-handshake" time. It can mean blocks of reserved time.

For example, when I taught independently in the Denver area, "normal" lessons typically involved 1.2 to 1.3 on the Hobbs. Adding in a fudge factor for pre and post-flight briefings, generally charged for a 2-hour block of time. Sometimes we were under, sometimes we were over but in either case, the price for the block was agreed to in advance and felt fair to both of us.

Charging on the Hobbs can be exactly the same (but without the budgeting certainty); the CFI just sets a Hobbs-based rate that assume a certain amount for ground time in addition.
 
Mark815 said:
That's the wrong time to talk about the lesson.
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Completely agree! The airplane is the worst place to learn. My approach has always been that I prebrief what we will fly, we fly so we have a common experience, then I teach in the debrief. When I first started instructing I tried to do it all in the airplane because I felt like that's what students expected and wanted. What I found out was that I was cheating them by not spending time without the airplane so they could learn.

I found this whole discussion on paying CFIs for hobbs vs block time interesting. It occurred to me that there's probably a host of students who complain about paying for ground instruction from their CFI, who find themselves years later complaining that their regional airline won't pay them for any time the cabin door isn't closed.
 
Autothrust Blue said:
It's also unsafe, but hey, what the hell, right? ;)

"blah blah blah"

"Shut up, I'm taxiing."
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Something I'm experimenting with is when I'm flying with a student and I want to give critique during taxi, I taxi the airplane. So far it seems to work decently well, and it gives the student a few minutes to focus on the critique.

I try to keep it minimal, though.

-Fox
 
When I freelance, what goes in the logbook is what I invoice. However, I log ground instruction with the student as well as flight instruction. It's more or less getting paid block-to-block.

Back when I instructed 141 I was probably way more lenient than I should have been with pre/post time invoiced, especially considering how much unpaid time went into student records and grading.
 
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