The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association and more than 300\ngeneral aviation organizations, representing hundreds of thousands of pilots,\nhave signed on to the Know Before You Go initiative, encouraging ramp fee transparency\nas a best practice in serving the GA community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An FBO ramp fee transparency effort launched by AOPA more\nthan two years ago now has the support of over 300 pilot organizations from\nacross the country. In a letter to these groups, AOPA President Mark Baker\noutlined the status of acceptance of FBO ramp fee transparency and called on\nthe industry to communicate its support and encouragement to FBOs, especially\nlarger chain FBOs such as Signature Flight Support and Atlantic Aviation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Signature posts its ramp fees for piston aircraft online,\nbut not for turbines or jets; Atlantic Aviation does not post any of its fees\nor prices online. Both require turbine and jet pilots to join a loyalty program\nbefore revealing any prices, although Atlantic does post a $400 facility fee\nwhen accessing its loyalty program. These two specific FBOs represent nearly\n200 locations across the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of the 16 chain FBOs, only three have fully complied with\nthe voluntary pricing transparency: ACI Jet, Cutter, and Wilson Air. Those\nthree companies comprise 12 locations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe thank those FBOs that serve pilots with openness,\u201d Baker\nsaid. \u201cIt\u2019s the right thing to do and, unfortunately, we just haven\u2019t gotten to\nwhere we need to be. In fact, we estimate that only about 25 percent of the\nmore than 3,300 FBOs across the country have instituted voluntary transparent\nbusiness practices by publishing their fees online. There is a lot of support\nfor fee and ramp transparency at our public-use airports and by working\ntogether, I know we can, and must, do better than this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cImagine flying on an airline and not being able to find out\nhow much you\u2019ll pay until you land. It just doesn\u2019t make sense.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The original Know Before You Go initiative was launched two\nyears ago by AOPA and five other major GA organizations and has significantly\ngrown to include a wide spectrum of aviation groups across the United States.\nThe program encourages FBOs to post ramp fees and fuel prices on their websites\nfor piston and turbine aircraft, or on AOPA\u2019s Airports and Destinations\nDirectory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe understand that FBOs provide necessary services and have\na right to run a thriving and profitable business, but not at the expense of\nthe general aviation community and regardless of the type of aircraft they fly,\u201d\nadded Baker. \u201cLike any other consumer, pilots have the right to know the cost\nof services at an airport before the bill comes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The letter comes on the heels of AOPA\u2019s push to bring\ntransparency and standardization to airport diagrams for GA and FBO parking\nramps. AOPA and partner organizations\nbelieve that airports that have GA transient ramps, GA-based ramps, and\/or FBO\nramps should label them as such on their diagrams, so pilots know their options\nbefore arriving at their destination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The FAA now requires nearly 700 airports to have a diagram,\nand the agency plans to increase that number to 3,000. AOPA conducted a review\nand found nearly 30 different terms for the same type of GA parking ramp in\nSouthern California alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cEvery pilot in the United States should be able to go\nonline and see what fees they will be charged and what their parking options\nare before they land at an airport,\u201d concluded Baker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association and more than 300 general aviation organizations, representing hundreds of thousands of pilots, have signed on to the Know Before You Go initiative, encouraging ramp fee transparency as a best practice in serving the GA community. An FBO ramp fee transparency effort launched by AOPA more than two years […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,115],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-maryland","category-national-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18228"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18229,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18228\/revisions\/18229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}