VA Students - Checkride and Examination Fees

HumbleSiPilot77

HumbleSiPilot77

Well-Known Member
Recent developments and information I received here @ ASU/ATP prompted me to start a thread about this and ask some guidance. Civilians students here have been paying "cash" to FAA examiners directly and looks like that is the set in stone route as far as checkrides go and I don't know what we can or should do about it. ASU's VA Certifying Office, Pat Tillman Center in Tempe told a friend of mine today that VA doesn't cover checkride fees. It is strange when you are required to pass these checkrides in order to graduate, they are part of your education and we don't get reimbursed for it. While I am waiting to hear back from ATP, I figure, they can write a check to the examiner and charge our flight accounts.

The whole issue is not the money for a checkride here and there, although 7-8 checkrides @ $700 each is a considerable amount...

Let me know how you guys are going around this issue, JDean explained he takes his examiner fees from his flight account and maybe this is how we should go on about that but would ATP let us do that I don't know.


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All I heard was the price range brother, supposedly FAA limited the amount checkrides examiners could give per month so they jacked up the prices . Apparently it was around 450 before and now it'll be around 600-700 ... A bit irritated about the whole deal ...


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I finished up at ATP in Phoenix just prior to the DPEs being restricted on the number of rides they could do in a month/quarter/year as a result in part of the "Fast Eddie" investigation. Thankfully I got all mine done at the $450 rate (except for my CFI Initial in North Vegas which was $600).

Since I had to get a loan to cover part of the training I just got more in the loan than I knew I would need. When the dispersments went to ATP they just sent my a check for the overpayment which was enough to cover the check rides (though I will admit that at one point I was doing check rides too soon for the check to arrive before the actual rides).

None of the examiners that I knew of while I was there would take anything other than cash, so it's doubtful they would take a check from ATP and let you pay ATP later. Even if ATP would front the money basically since your account would be negative so no flying till you paid up (had this happen to a friend, esentially ATP wouldn't let him use a plane for a check ride because he was past due and had to wait a week for it all to clear before he could take his check ride).

Unless the VA overpaid ATP there really isn't money in your account to cover the check rides without shorting something else (less cross country, fewer checkride prep flights) which, unless you had flight time prior to ATP, means you might not have the times to meet requirements. Again, not sure how the VA would handle the shortage and need for additional payment as I did all the financing on my own.
 
Which one of you is a veteran guys? Thanks for the good info, this seems like an issue ASU needs to handle with the VA rather than ATP.


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Spoke to vets that have been at ASU's flight program, one thing I heard is that they (VA) reimburse you money, similar to ATP VA pack explains but it goes against your total length of 36 months under post 9/11 GI Bill benefits ... In that case, I'd rather pay for the checkrides ... It's costly but compared to entire flight training the costs are negligible in my opinion ...


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