Flight Time Vs. Air Time Personal Logbook

[vortex]

On 4/21/2018 at 1:02 PM, Blackmac said:

You are the first person to state what I have said from the beginning of this tirade, that the tech log should indicate what is being billed, as the actual cost to the operator.

When I was auditing an operator on behalf of the Federal Government, I would check the Journey, and Air frame/ Engine log books entries to see if they all matched what was being billed the customer. The worst operators to try changing times and over billing are the ones flying fires. Every client who has a long or short term contract has the right to see the companies log books. 

The industry as whole is it's own worst enemy by keeping rates so low and undercutting each other.  

Have you ever been in a taxi cab stuck in traffic or at a stop light and watched the meter tick when you haven't moved?? Maybe TC should make sure that the cabbies stop billing for that time too...

[Heliduck]

3 hours ago, vortex said:

Have you ever been in a taxi cab stuck in traffic or at a stop light and watched the meter tick when you haven't moved?? Maybe TC should make sure that the cabbies stop billing for that time too...

What about renting a small digger for the weekend to dig a hole at home, I pay for the whole day but I only have it running for a few hours so maybe the government should regulate that as well. I know, instead of unlimited klms for a hire car why doesn’t the government make sure I’m only charged for the klms I drive? I had an electrician around last weekend & I saw him talking on the phone about another job, damned government shouldn’t allow him to charge me For the whole hour while he’s on the phone to someone else.

sarcastic comments as I am a passionate believer that as soon as you get the regulators involved in what clients are invoiced the whole industry is doomed. It’s up to me to check how much the electrician charged me vs how long he was on the job for & argue my case if I’m not happy, not the government. Likewise if a company charges twice as many hours for a helicopter than it actually flew it’s up to the representative who signs the flight ticket to ensure its correct. If they are happy to pay twice as much as the machine flew then so be it, they’re responsible for their budget, not the Operator. Continued abuse of this trust would no doubt see the operator sitting on the bench while everyone else got the work, so honesty pays off in the end.

If Blakmac wants the government involved in everything I’d suggest he would me more comfortable in China.

I keep repeating myself - time in service is regulated as it is an airworthiness requirement from the manufacturer which the regulator has passed into law, there are no options but to comply. How businesses structure their invoicing is between the customer(buyer beware) & the business. 

[robottxt]

20 hours ago, Heliduck said:

What about renting a small digger for the weekend to dig a hole at home, I pay for the whole day but I only have it running for a few hours so maybe the government should regulate that as well. I know, instead of unlimited klms for a hire car why doesn’t the government make sure I’m only charged for the klms I drive? I had an electrician around last weekend & I saw him talking on the phone about another job, damned government shouldn’t allow him to charge me For the whole hour while he’s on the phone to someone else.

sarcastic comments as I am a passionate believer that as soon as you get the regulators involved in what clients are invoiced the whole industry is doomed. It’s up to me to check how much the electrician charged me vs how long he was on the job for & argue my case if I’m not happy, not the government. Likewise if a company charges twice as many hours for a helicopter than it actually flew it’s up to the representative who signs the flight ticket to ensure its correct. If they are happy to pay twice as much as the machine flew then so be it, they’re responsible for their budget, not the Operator. Continued abuse of this trust would no doubt see the operator sitting on the bench while everyone else got the work, so honesty pays off in the end.

If Blakmac wants the government involved in everything I’d suggest he would me more comfortable in China.

I keep repeating myself - time in service is regulated as it is an airworthiness requirement from the manufacturer which the regulator has passed into law, there are no options but to comply. How businesses structure their invoicing is between the customer(buyer beware) & the business. 

The government does heavily regulate the digger operator and electricians working hours and pay. If both are on a job site or place of work,,,, its considered "work" and they are paid for said "work" including government regulated overtime.  How you pay a company for renting equipment has nothing to do with how the employee is paid other than being factored into the price of the rental or service...   Its Federally regulated transportation employees that get screwed out of ever getting acknowledged the hours of work they put in and the hopes of ever seeing a penny of overtime. Then toss  in the heavly abused season averaging agreement.  And you wonder why pilots are bitter about being the lowest paid on some job site.

[shakey]

3 hours ago, robottxt said:

The government does heavily regulate the digger operator and electricians working hours and pay. If both are on a job site or place of work,,,, its considered "work" and they are paid for said "work" including government regulated overtime.  How you pay a company for renting equipment has nothing to do with how the employee is paid other than being factored into the price of the rental or service...   Its Federally regulated transportation employees that get screwed out of ever getting acknowledged the hours of work they put in and the hopes of ever seeing a penny of overtime. Then toss  in the heavly abused season averaging agreement.  And you wonder why pilots are bitter about being the lowest paid on some job site.

The difference is also the digger guy and cab guy won't do it for free because their boss has showed them a stack of resumes of their potential replacements.😎 I used to love that one.

[Freewheel]

January 23, 2018 email from Cheif of Standards Deborah Martin:

My intention is to resolve any misinterpretations regarding air time vs flight time once and for all.  

I can assure you that the expertise and experience required to address your concerns is within the Standards Branch; specifically Mr. Freeman as Program Manager Aerial Work, Air Taxi and Commuter Standards.  Although, I’m not a helicopter pilot I do have close to 40 years of experience as a fixed wing pilot in both industry and TC; and as Chief, Commercial Flight Standards understand the issue very well.  

 If you are open to hearing us, I believe we will be able to address your concerns.  

 Deborah

 

Hey Deb,

5 months now...still waiting...

Experts don’t generally take 5 months to answer basic true or false questions...

[Freewheel]

On 4/21/2018 at 5:10 PM, Heliduck said:

So if your on 4 hour minimums & only fly 1 hour you can’t invoice 4 hours?

Invoices are not legislated, aircraft & pilot flight times are. The tech log, pilots log book & journey log should all match perfectly, invoicing is irrelevant. The question is which time does a pilot enter into their logbook, & after 65 pages I’m still no wiser. I guess I’ll just put in whatever time the Chief Pilot of the company says to & leave it at that.

I’m sure many pilots take that approach. Unfortunately, it may not offer the protection you’d expect when things go south and they find the,selves in a tribunal or court case.

Afetr, all it is the pilot in commands responsibility to ensure accurate entries in flight records. As far as I know there is no requirement for the company to verify its accuracy...as pointed out in this Aviation Occupational Safety Tribunal:

https://www.canada.ca/en/occupational-health-and-safety-tribunal-canada/programs/decisions/2015/ohstc-2015-009.html

That didn’t stop a federal Health and Safety Officer from claiming otherwise and levelling charges on the company, however.

here are just a few relevant excerpts.

[24]             I note that at page 24 of her report, HSO Wilson refers to section 124 of the Code, citing the obligation for the employer to ensure that the health and safety at work of every person employed by the employer is protected. She goes on to state that a direction (presumably the direction under appeal) was issued ordering the employer to follow established procedures as outlined in the Manual to ensure pilots that are employed by Black Sheep are accurately capturing the correct flight and duty times for the trips they operate in the aircraft journey log books. I am left to wonder whether it is that particular section of the Code that, in HSO Wilson’s opinion, was contravened by the appellant, short of her so stating explicitly. In my view, it would be a stretch for me to interpret the broad obligation set out in section 124 in a way that implies the very specific obligation for the employer that was found to exist by HSO Wilson, i.e. to ensure that the entries an employee is required to write in the aircraft journey log book under the terms of the Manual, are accurate. So specific a requirement would typically be found in a regulation and there is no suggestion in the HSO’s report that the employer is in breach of its general duty of due diligence for safety, which is usually required before a finding that a contravention of section 124 has occurred.

 

30]             I will first look at the obligation of the employer under the relevant sections of the Manual. I understand the Manual to represent the conditions under which the employer is authorized by Transport Canada to operate its business. It is not disputed that the Manual in existence at the time of the accident was approved by Transport Canada. When I read sections 5.2.2 and 5.2.3 of the Manual, I simply cannot reach the same conclusion as HSO Wilson as to the extent of the employer’s obligations. Applying fairly basic principles of interpretation, it is clearly stated in section 5.2.2 that “pilots are responsible for entering all relevant flight and duty time information into the program”. It is worth noting that such flight and duty time includes flying time for other operators and/or private aircraft. The pilot’s obligation is also to forward, at least once a month, the data to the office for copy and retention. The purpose of that requirement is to allow the employer to track, as it is required to do under the next section, section 5.2.3, the number of flight hours to ensure that the number of hours does not exceed the limitations set out in that section and to provide appropriate rest periods to its pilots. The Manual specifically states that the pilots and the company share in the responsibility of ensuring that the number of hours is not exceeded. The Manual provides that should any person become aware that a pilot will exceed the allowed times, that person must advise the Operations Manager.

 

[31]             It seems clear to me that requiring the employer to verify the entries made by their employees is not supported by the wording of the Manual. Employees are, pursuant to section 126 of the Code, required to fulfill their obligations regarding matters of health and safety. The Manual clearly places the responsibility of accurately reporting flight hours in the log book, on the employees. I note that those hours include flight time for the appellant, but also with other operators or private flying. Requiring the employer to ensure the accuracy of all entries, including the latter, would imply some kind of independent investigation into the actual flying time of the pilots, which is not in my view a reasonable interpretation of the Manual. In my view, if that was the intended result, the wording of the section should have so expressed more clearly.

[RDM 1]

Guys I am little confused. Now I have not read the entire 67 pages. So forgive me if this has been said.

It has been many years since I flew VFR so maybe things have changed.  VFR and IFR have many different billing schemes but one thing did remain the same AIRTIME. (Tech log / Journer log)

Lets say I worked on a contract or adhoc job things were pretty much the same. When the A/C rotors start turning I noted the time. If I flew from point A to B let's say 1 hour airtime we would normal bill 1.1 (maybe 1.2) that is what the customer paid on his invoice. In the journey log (do they still call it that?) I "billed" 1.0 hr to the A/C which was component time.

Then lets say I was on a soil sampling job with a Longranger.... roughly 3 hours fuel for this type of work. Up to 20 landings with rock doctors in and out and in and out. They could be 2 min or 5 min getting their sample. 

At the end of the day  I burned 3 tanks of gas. (9hrs) but I may be only airborne for 5 hrs. The customer got a bill for 9hrs but  the A/C had 5hrs charged toward component time.

Like I said long time for me but am I missing something in this thread. It was always simple. BTW - HOBBS meter we had no idea what the heck that was. 

Now the IFR offshore contract world  on a heavy were some different. We had Rotor Time / Block Time and Airtime. The billing scheme was very very different and as drivers we did not know nor care. Just keep the numbers accurate. BUT one thing remained the same the A/C was only charged Airtime. This was not taken from the WOW switch or HUMS, it was taken from what we as a crew noted on our Flight Plan.

We may START at 07:00 (noted) we may BLOCK  (noted) and begin  to taxi  07:15....(we may have hold times depending on traffic for 15 minutes) on wheels up we noted Airtime till rig landing. Yet the A/C was only billed wheels up to wheels down. The client was billed block time (depending on contract)

Again, if I am off the mark I am open to correction but I am confused by the 67 pages. And of course TC's responses.

Our inspectors were always quite clear and agreed.

Hmmm.....

 

 

[AlphaMike]

Yes, it's all been said. Many, many times in this thread. But what the heck, why not a recap. 😀

The invoicing part is irrelevant. TC has nothing to say about how you bill the customer, so you can do that however you want. Think about a production job, say applying fertilizer,  where the customer just pays by the acre: they wouldn't even know or care how many hours the aircraft flew, let alone details about air time, flight time, engine run time or whatever.

Aircraft logbook is easy: I think everyone agrees on what airtime is (skids up to skids down) and that's what goes in the aircraft journey log. The problem is what to do about your personal flight & duty time records. So, if the helicopter was in the air for an hour (1.0 in the journey log) but you were at the controls for a 1.2, waiting for people to get in and out etc., which of those do you use for your personal flight time records?

What if you put 60 hours on the aircraft in a week (air time, in the journey log) but you were actually at the controls for 70 hours? Did you just bust the CARS 60 hours in 7 days flight time limit or not? That's the real issue here, I believe.

 

[RDM 1]

Well now I feel like the goof. Should have read the entire thread not just a snippet! 🤒

Still simple in my mind. Rotor starts turning  my personal flight time (log book starts ticking) rotor stops my flight time stops. 

 

[Winnie]

Yeah Ronnie. TC has been going mad these last 10 years... They decided that ICAO wasn't correct and neither was the AC they issued, so they cancelled it.

 

They claim in the CAR's that in a skid equipped helicopter AIRTIME and FLIGHT TIME is the same...