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30/07/2009, 7:13 PM roofy Joined on 31/05/2009 Posts 7 Maintenance Rip Off Has anyone else been subjected to an invoice for "Continued Airworthy Management Services" ? This unannounced invoice in respect of a Public Cat. PA28 that only one month ago had an invoice of over £4000 for its annual, arrived in the post today. No warning just pay £460 for allowing us, the maintenance organisation, to carryout works through the year on your aircraft, for which of course you will be invoiced additionally and seperately!!! Has the world of light aviation gone completely mad, are the authorities with their new maintenance contracts encouraging what is without doubt a total rip off. Am I alone in thinking the time is near when it will just be too costly to own an aircraft that has been subjected to constant care and attention over past years, is it time to cut and run?    Report

30/07/2009, 9:08 PM Silver Fox Joined on 13/12/2004 In a world of magnets and miracles. Posts 61 Re: Maintenance Rip Off Sounds like it might be time to look around for another maintenance organisation. I'm still waiting for the bill for my annual from the end of June but am not expecting it to be anything like that despite a new DI being fitted and various other bitss and pieces. Where do you fly from? I may be able to suggest an alternative. Bob.      Report

30/07/2009, 11:08 PM roofy Joined on 31/05/2009 Posts 7 Re: Maintenance Rip Off From Kemble but have my service a bit north of there. The invoice states the following are the maintenance organisations responsibilities and for these they are demanding £400 (convenient lump figure) plus VAT total £460 The narrative states "To carry out continued airworthy management for the period 15/5/09 to 14/5/09".  It is worthy of note that through that period I have paid the organisation £3614 plus a further £130 for the radio work on the aircraft and am mindful that a check is shortly due, the average cost of which is around £500. Justification for the "bolt from the blue" is as below 1 Aircraft to be within the scope of approval . 2 Organisation to apply all the requirements for continuing airworthiness. 3 Aircraft to be maintained to lamp and provide a copy to owner. 4 To advise the owner when maintenance is due. 5 To comply with all airworthy directives and service bulletins. 6 Rectify all defects reported by owner or discovered during maintenance. 7 Comply with requirements of Life Limited parts or inspections of component parts. 8 Maintain all technical records, log books and worksheets. 9 Comply with EASA part 21 in respect of modifications and repairs. 10 Inform the CAA when aircraft is not presented for the required scheduled maintenance or if the contracted arrangement is not respected. 11 Comply with CAP 393 in respect of reportable occurences. 12 Carry out airworthiness review of craft and its records and issue ARC with copy to CAA. 13 Advise CAA whenever the arrangement is denounced by either party. I feel most folk will agree that 99% of this list is the format against which all aircraft servicing has been handled for the past God knows how many years. It is of course listed as a justification for the presentation of an invoice that requires no additional input from the maintenance company outside of their normal remit when servicing aircraft.    Report

31/07/2009, 10:31 AM Silver Fox Joined on 13/12/2004 In a world of magnets and miracles. Posts 61 Re: Maintenance Rip Off  roofy wrote: Justification for the "bolt from the blue" is as below 1 Aircraft to be within the scope of approval . 2 Organisation to apply all the requirements for continuing airworthiness. 3 Aircraft to be maintained to lamp and provide a copy to owner. 4 To advise the owner when maintenance is due. 5 To comply with all airworthy directives and service bulletins. 6 Rectify all defects reported by owner or discovered during maintenance. 7 Comply with requirements of Life Limited parts or inspections of component parts. 8 Maintain all technical records, log books and worksheets. 9 Comply with EASA part 21 in respect of modifications and repairs. 10 Inform the CAA when aircraft is not presented for the required scheduled maintenance or if the contracted arrangement is not respected. 11 Comply with CAP 393 in respect of reportable occurences. 12 Carry out airworthiness review of craft and its records and issue ARC with copy to CAA. 13 Advise CAA whenever the arrangement is denounced by either party. Sounds very like they are now charging you for something they should have been doing anyway before the EASA stuff. Sorry I can't offer any help with an alternative but would recommend ringing round to see what anyone else can offer. £500 for a 50 hour check is also rather steep in my experiance. Best of luck! Bob.    Report

31/07/2009, 8:23 PM Aviator|Chris Joined on 28/01/2009 EGBW Posts 378 Re: Maintenance Rip Off All I can say is "ouch" and best of luck finding an alternative company for your aircraft. GA is crippled enough by rising random costs without companies adding their own just to keep the birds flying.    Report

06/08/2009, 5:58 PM A and C Joined on 12/07/2009 Posts 13 Re: Maintenance Rip Off On the face of it this is a charge for things that should have been included in the annual maintenance costs of your aircraft, the problem is thus:- The CAA have insisted that the new EASA part M maintenance regulations have to be in place by the timetable set out by EASA and unlike most states in europe the UK has not used the additional time allowed by EASA to get Part M in place. This has resulted in the UK maintenance industry having to be at the forefront of the introduction of the new and ever changing regulations that have been gold plated by the UK CAA. The end result of the large amount of extra paperwork is that most maintenance companys have had to employ an extra person to do the extra paper work, this along with new CAA fees is why the companys have to make a charge for the CAMO. In short the maintenance companys have had a lot more paperwork and CAA charges imposed on them and some one has to pay these charges. I agree with you that this is a system that has no airworthiness benifit for the extra cost but be clear, it is not money is not going into the hands of the owners of the maintenance companys............. well not for long............ the money goes to the CAA and to the cost of extra staff pushing extra paperwork about.      Report

21/08/2009, 10:48 AM Silver Fox Joined on 13/12/2004 In a world of magnets and miracles. Posts 61 Re: Maintenance Rip Off  Silver Fox wrote: Sounds like it might be time to look around for another maintenance organisation. I'm still waiting for the bill for my annual from the end of June but am not expecting it to be anything like that despite a new DI being fitted and various other bitss and pieces. Where do you fly from? I may be able to suggest an alternative. Bob. Well the bill for the annual finally arrived and as expected it was just a tad over £3K, the list of work done went into 3 pages and as said before included a new DI additional charge for CAA stuff was about £85. As stated previously I think you need to seriously look for a better deal. All the best.    Report

09/01/2012, 9:36 AM redbaron999 Joined on 09/01/2012 Posts 1 Re: Maintenance Rip Off Just noticed your post in 2009. I took a PA 28 in for an EASA annual at AKKI in Turweston with a quoted price of £1700. They sold me an engine overhaul which they quoted at £10,000. When the invoices arrived they had stung me over £30,000.   For sale a PA 28, I have done with GA!    Report

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