Club Management Issue

"Peter Duniho" wrote in message


The government does not require you to be a jerk. It simply requires
that if you choose to be a Good Samaritan, you don't accept any
compensation, not even the usual pro-rata share of direct operating
expenses.

To add to the "jerk-ness" factor, if you have any relationship with the
passenger such that the flight could be construed as to be generating "favor
or goodwill", you could still be held in violation even if no cash changed
hands. (Based on NTSB rulings, not FAR's.)

--
John T
http://tknowlogy.com/TknoFlyer
http://www.pocketgear.com/products_s...veloperid=4415
____________________

You are forgetting that if it can be construed that the pilot may garner
favor from the passenger then the flight is commercial. If I, a securties
analyst, offer a ride to somenone (to see his dying spouse) who works for a
company in a sector that I follow and I pay all the expenses, it is
prohibited under the regs. Even if I was previously planning to practice
landings at different airports, it is still a prohibited flight if I take
this passenger. The government is requiring me to be a jerk

Mike
MU-2


"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
"Mike Rapoport" wrote in message
nk.net...
No you cannot because you do not have commonality of purpose. Its just
one
of those cases where the government requires you to be a jerk.

The government does not require you to be a jerk. It simply requires that
if you choose to be a Good Samaritan, you don't accept any compensation,
not
even the usual pro-rata share of direct operating expenses.

Pete

I am certainly no regs lawyer, so could someone tell me where this
"commonality of purpose" clause is?

I have read several examples that say I can take a customer of mine on a
trip related to business so long as the business is not transporting that
person to the destination. Now you are saying that because I want him to
buy something from me I can't do it?

Also, how ridiculously stupid is this going to get? If you are a
politician, you can't take anyone flying because you may one day be seeking
their vote or contribution?

I can't fly anyone from my company with me because I am obviously currying
favor there.

How about a doctor flying a patient for treatment into the big city to see a
specialist?

I think someones hyper sensitive lawyer went overboard somewhere.



"Mike Rapoport" wrote in message
nk.net...
You are forgetting that if it can be construed that the pilot may garner
favor from the passenger then the flight is commercial. If I, a securties
analyst, offer a ride to somenone (to see his dying spouse) who works for
a
company in a sector that I follow and I pay all the expenses, it is
prohibited under the regs. Even if I was previously planning to practice
landings at different airports, it is still a prohibited flight if I take
this passenger. The government is requiring me to be a jerk

Mike
MU-2


"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
"Mike Rapoport" wrote in message
nk.net...
No you cannot because you do not have commonality of purpose. Its
just
one
of those cases where the government requires you to be a jerk.

The government does not require you to be a jerk. It simply requires
that
if you choose to be a Good Samaritan, you don't accept any compensation,
not
even the usual pro-rata share of direct operating expenses.

Pete

The mechanic was also on the trip, and was getting paid for his time.
Makes it a part 135 operation as far as the FAA is concerned, even if
"Mark" didn't receive a dime.


OK, I'm willing to buy that.


I am not. Is there a specific rule that says that because someone on the
plane is getting paid to go somewhere that it is now a 135 operation?

Let's see. You pay your chauffer for coming with you on your Jet so he can
drive you around when you get there. Now, your privately owned jet has a
pilot, co pilot and chauffer on board and they are all getting paid to go.
Now its 135?

"Dude" wrote in message

I am certainly no regs lawyer, so could someone tell me where this
"commonality of purpose" clause is?

That's the very part I was having a hard time with. We're talking about the
US only, but the NTSB ruled (see my post just off the root of this thread)
in a case involving a pair of TV reporters, an insrument student and his
instructor. The student made arrangements with the TV studio to fly the
reporters to another location unbeknownst to the instructor. The reporters
were not to return with the student/instructor. The NTSB ruled that while
the student may have been in the plane to receive instruction, the
passengers were in the plane purely for transportation to Point B.
Therefore, the student was in violation of Part 135 and 61.118 and the
instructor was also in violation of Part 135.

I have read several examples that say I can take a customer of mine
on a trip related to business so long as the business is not
transporting that person to the destination. Now you are saying that
because I want him to buy something from me I can't do it?

If he's buying from you, he's a customer and not an employee.

Also, how ridiculously stupid is this going to get? ...
I think someones hyper sensitive lawyer went overboard somewhere.

No doubt. My assertion throughout this thread is that it's patently
ridiculous for the FAA to forbid me to help a fellow pilot retrieve his
plane and have said pilot pay what would amount to 1/4 the cost of the
roundtrip flight. However, based on FAA and NTSB rulings, I cannot accept
any money from him nor can I even take him at all if I'm in a position to
gain "favor or goodwill" from him.

Of course, if we take that last definition to its extreme, I can't even take
friends on local fun flights that I would still be taking without them
because I would be generating "favor and goodwill" with them.

--
John T
http://tknowlogy.com/TknoFlyer
http://www.pocketgear.com/products_s...veloperid=4415
____________________

"Peter Duniho" wrote in
:

lots of stuff snipped

Whether we think the rules make sense, or whether we like them, is
irrelevant.


THAT kind of thinking will lead to ANY opinion you have, or I have, of any
law or regulation being irrelevant. An unjust, unfair, and plain STUPID
law/regulation that defies all common sense deserves to be defied. Paying
for a buddie's fuel for him to take you somewhere is HARDLY a crime....

Yes, most will cower and obey, lest they loss their right to fly, and
perhaps when the time comes, I may as well... but that doesn't make it
right, and it CERTAINLY doesn't make it irrelevant.


--
ET


"A common mistake people make when trying to design something
completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete
fools."---- Douglas Adams

Note - Actual discussion is after the rant. You can avoid the rant by
skipping down to the part after the large "Argh".


-------
Oh boy if you didn't step right onto two of my favorite, all time, land
mines - so called "case law" and administrative regulations with the power
of law.

Case Law in any other profession would be held up to be a monopolistic
practice by a conspiracy of thieves calling their gang by the ominous name -
"The Bar".

Seriously, couldn't the legislative branch get off its lazy arse and rewrite
the laws so that they either clearly state what the case law reflects, or in
such a way as to negate the case law in instances of judicial activism or
wrong headedness? Isn't this the very heart of their job? Legislature has
law in its root for Pete's sake.

Instead we now have the legilature throwing out minimum sentencing
guidelines and other crazy crap because they can't manage to get a
reasonably competent judicial branch that is willing to do its job.

As for Adminstrative Law - if you hired someone to take care of your most
precious belongings, and they delegated that responsibility to someone you
never heard of and didn't even pay much attention to what they were doing,
you would fire, if not shoot them. Unless they are a legislator, in which
case, you reelect them!

AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!

That's two rants in one night, sorry
---------

Anyway, you have a reasonably good way to look at this, and you are probably
right. If I were Mark, I would avoid compensation as well. In any case, it
would appear that most of the examples where people got nailed they made the
mistake of opening their big mouths or having obvious motives.

So lets say its too late, that he did ask for pro rata gas.

Here is what I say Mark should do (if his lawyer agrees). He should claim
that it was his desire to help his friends get the plane back. That may be
a weak excuse for commonality of purpose, but only if he had another
purpose. Now, let the FAA prove that he was doing it build hours. If its
his plane, he likely doesn't need the hours, so they are on shakey ground
themselves. If he states that it was his purpose to retrieve the plane,
then the FAA is in the position of PROVING that he had an alterior motive.
LET THEM PROVE IT!

The guy with the film crew was obviously trying to lessen the cost of his
lesson.

The guy with the ambulance got off in the end because his only purpose was
to help achieve the same mission that the mechanic and pilot were working
on. The fact that they were paid for their participation would be
incidental business.

The guy in the party example was transporting people who had paid to be
somewhere, so they were paying passengers, and thats gotta be a violation.

The guy with the lease dodge was too smart for his own good. He was
obviously doing what the laws were written to regulate in the first place.

To me, the closest case is the ambulance one, but that guy took no money, so
you need to determine how important the money was in the decision to grant
the appeal.




"John T" wrote in message
ws.com...
"Geoffrey Barnes" wrote in message
k.net

On Monday, our club A&P cashed in some favors with a client of his,
who we'll call "Mark". Mark agreed to take the mechanic to the
remote airport in Mark's personal aircraft. If it maters, Mark is
not a member of the flying club, but is friendly with several of our
members and was willing to help us out. Once all of this was
arranged, Paul was asked if he would like to go along on the trip,
but he said he was unable to do so. So instead, one of our club CFIs
and another club member ("Luke") -- who were scheduled to do some
instrument training that evening in a different aircraft -- agreed to
go along and fly the 182 back after the mechanic got things squared
away.


OK, after helpful tips from George Patterson and Todd Pattist, I have come
to the conclusion that my understanding of 61.113 was indeed wrong.
(Sidebar: I don't have any of my old FAR/AIMs. Did 61.118 change to
61.113
in a re-write of 14CFR?)

For those with AOPA membership (thanks to George's tip):
http://www.aopa.org/members/files/pi...04/pc0403.html
http://www.aopa.org/members/files/pi...95/pc9503.html

In the 2004 article, the pilot was found to have been compensated due to
the
"greasing of the wheels" for possible future work even though the pilot
was
not paid directly for the 4 flights.

The 1995 article references a pilot flying skydivers to altitude. The
pilot
argued that he wasn't operating for a profit, but the Board rejected his
arguments since the skydivers paid a share of the flight costs purely to
achieve altitude for jumps.

These articles referred to NTSB cases posted by Todd. Based on Todd's
helpful links, I found a couple other interesting findings including:

http://www.ntsb.gov/alj/O_n_O/docs/aviation/4791.PDF
Pilot flew a mechanic and owner to repair a helicopter. Pilot accepted no
money (not even shared expenses) but was charged with violating 61.118
(now
61.113??). The NTSB upheld the pilot's appeal and the pilot was not
sanctioned because he not only used his own aircraft at his own expense,
but
he did so without the intent to generate favor or goodwill with the
passengers.

So, the FAR still doesn't reflect the "common purpose" phrase implemented
as
law by the NTSB in 1994.

And there's the rub. There is *case law* implementing the "common
purpose"
phrase, but no regulation. This begs the question: How are pilots
supposed
to know and follow the rules when the rules aren't published? The
FAA/NTSB
may argue that case law is published (after all, I found it online), but
common sense suggests that 14CFR should be the single source for these
rules. If case law changes the meaning of a given regulation, then the
regulation should be changed. That's just my opinion and I know all about
the "everybody has one" rule.

The "common purpose" definition appears to hinge on whether the
passenger's
purpose is to move from Point A to Point B (say, home airport to stranded
airplane).

As such, this new understanding I have of this case law implies that
"Mark"
is really setting himself up for enforcement action by the FAA. His
*only*
hope of avoiding sanction (assuming the local FSDO investigates), is to
accept absolutely no payment for this flight - and even that isn't going
to
assure him of no action taken against him (see the "favor and goodwill"
phrases used by the NTSB and relate that to "cashed in some favors" in the
OP).

For pilots finding themselves in this situation (needing to retrieve a
plane
from another location due to maintenance, weahter, etc.), either hire an
air
taxi/charter service or hitch a ride from a pilot already going to your
destination. Pilots providing the ride should either have prior plans to
go
to the destination airport or accept absolutely no form of compensation
(no
shared expenses, favor or goodwill).

It still sounds asinine to me, but the FAA/NTSB appear to be very
forcefully
drawing the line between air charter and non-charter flying. Accepting a
fellow pilot's request for help is quite a different animal from, say,
flying an acquaintance to visit family. Again, just my opinion.

--
John T
http://tknowlogy.com/TknoFlyer
http://www.pocketgear.com/products_s...veloperid=4415
____________________

"ET" wrote in message
...
Whether we think the rules make sense, or whether we like them, is
irrelevant.

THAT kind of thinking will lead to ANY opinion you have, or I have, of any
law or regulation being irrelevant.

You need to stay in context. My point is that, for the purpose of
understanding how the rules are interpreted and enforced (which is the point
here), what you think of the rules makes no difference.

Don't like the rules? Sure, it makes sense to work to change them. But
until you DO change them, you still need to understand how they are
currently interpreted and enforced. You ignore them at your own peril, and
no amount of opinionating regarding the rules will save you.

Pete

Excellent research and reporting by John T. One question:

Pilots providing the ride should either have prior plans to go
to the destination airport or accept absolutely no form of compensation (no
shared expenses, favor or goodwill).

In your research, did you find definitions of the terms "favor" and/or
"goodwill"? Anyone I have ever flown anywhere for any purpose has
thanked me for it---that sounds like "goodwill".

You are right, this whole situation is asinine. Thanks for doing the
work to try to explain it.

Oh come on.
A court would throw this out in an instant - because Mark shared the cost no
matter how you try to twist it.
In reality he is paying more than his share!

He would like to be reimbursed for only the fuel, not the maintenance which
is his portion of the cost of doing the flight!!!!!
like it or not - flying your own plane costs twice the fuel (or abit more)
for every hour you fly.

You can figure all the combinations and permutations, but no matter how you
twist it, it's a private flight.

"Mike Rapoport" wrote in message
.net...
Wow! Good thing this issue came up when the dollars were relatively few!
All kinds of issues here. The following is just my opinion:

The owners are responsible for maitenance, they should pay for the cost of
"failed maitenance". That includes all the related costs. Perhaps they
will learn a lesson about preventative maitenance.

The owners should get their portion of the rental fees for the return
flight.

"Mark" should get a 135 certificate before he gets in trouble.

Mike
MU-2


"Geoffrey Barnes" wrote in message
k.net...
First off, I'm not directly involved in this situation, but I am trying
to
gain an understanding on how other FBOs and flying clubs deal with
something
like it.

One of our club members was flying our 182 -- which the club leases from
the
two gentlemen who own it -- and had what appeared to be an alternator
failure. I'll call this person "Paul" to keep things straight. Anyway,
"Paul" landed at an airport several hundred miles away late on Sunday
night.
There is an A&P at the field during normal working hours, but not on
Sunday
night. Rather than wait, Paul decided to rent a car and drive home,
leaving
the 182 behind.

On Monday, our club A&P cashed in some favors with a client of his, who
we'll call "Mark". Mark agreed to take the mechanic to the remote
airport
in Mark's personal aircraft. If it maters, Mark is not a member of the
flying club, but is friendly with several of our members and was willing
to
help us out. Once all of this was arranged, Paul was asked if he would
like
to go along on the trip, but he said he was unable to do so. So
instead,
one of our club CFIs and another club member ("Luke") -- who were
scheduled
to do some instrument training that evening in a different aircraft --
agreed to go along and fly the 182 back after the mechanic got things
squared away.

Despite it being a long evening for everyone, it all worked out pretty
well.
The aircraft is back, the repairs were fairly cheap, Luke got his
instrument
lesson on the way home, and nobody even missed a scheduled flight in the
182. But a debate is raging concerning the costs for getting everything
done. Unfortuneately, the club does not seem to have any specific rules
about this kind of situation. This lack of guidance from the club rule
book
rather suprises me, and I hope to fix that issue in the very near
future.
But for the moment, we need to make up policy as we go along.

There are four different costs involved here. Our A&P charged us $100
for
the travel time back and forth. The parts and labor to fix the 182
amounted
to $70. Mark (the non-club member who flew everyone down there) would
like
to be reimbursed for his fuel costs, which are around $175. And the
182's
flight home racked up about $270 in rental fees, about $225 of which
would
normally be sent directly to the aircraft owners.

Under the terms of our lease with the owners of the 182, they are
responsible for maintence costs, so the $70 to fix the plane seems to be
pretty clearly their responsibility. All of the other costs are, with
the
club's lack of written policy, open to debate at the moment. What would
your club or FBO do in this situation?


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