Flight training at Delaware Aviation

Wet. Ground instruction is published separately at $45/hr, which is higher than any of the three flight-instruction figures implied by the dual and solo pairs.

1. 1

   What do you charge per hour for flight instruction, and is ground instruction billed at the same rate?Missing from their site

   This is the number that is missing from the site. Ground is often billed separately and at a different rate.

2. 2

   Does the instructor rate change for the Instrument, Commercial, or CFI, or is it flat across everything?Missing from their site

   Plenty of schools charge more for advanced instruction. A flat rate quoted for the Private can climb later.

3. 3

   What does flight instruction cost per hour?Missing from their site

   Three aeroplanes are each priced solo and dual, and the three differences are not the same: $35, $30 and $35. There is no single instruction rate to take from them.

4. 4

   Do you offer block rates or prepay discounts, and what is the refund policy if I stop partway?

   Block discounts are common and rarely published. The refund terms matter more than the discount.

5. 5

   What do you charge for the written test, the checkride, and the examiner's fee?

   The DPE fee alone runs $800 to $1,200 in most of the country and is almost never in a quoted hourly rate.

6. 6

   How many trainers and how many full-time instructors do you have right now?

   Availability decides your pace, and pace decides your total more than the hourly rate does.

What to compare their answer against

Not Delaware Aviation's rates. The middle of what 10 New York schools charge, to hold your phone quote against.

From the schools here that publish full rate cards, the same sample behind the Flight Training Cost Report. Delaware Aviation is not in it.

What we checked

THREE DUAL AND SOLO PAIRS THAT DO NOT AGREE. Subtracting solo from dual gives $35 on the Cessna 150, $30 on the Cessna 172 and $35 on the Comanche. Two matching subtractions make a derivation safe, as Sevier County Choppers showed in Tennessee; three that disagree kill it, because there is no way to tell which is the rate and which is a rounding or a discount. The $30 is on the 172, which is the aeroplane a student would actually fly, so picking the majority $35 would be picking against the default trainer. Ground instruction is separately published at $45/hr, above all three. Recorded with the aeroplane rates published and the instructor rate missing.