Cost Sharing Question

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ClarksonCote

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ClarksonCote
Hi all, new private pilot here, and I have a question about cost sharing...

I am interested in renting a plane to visit family 200nmi away. I'd like to potentially share the cost with other people. However, I want clarification on the full definition of what is considered "common purpose"

For example, I have a friend who grew up about 75% of the way to my destination. I would like to land there on the way to my hometown, drop them off, and continue.

The most conservative definition of common purpose is the same destination, but legally many places say that common purpose is like carpooling back from college with people, and I've certainly done that too (and dropped people off along the way). I also looked up definitions of common purpose, and it sounds like dropping a friend off while I'm already en route would fit (our common purpose is a weekend visit to our homes). And I'm flying to my hometown anyway, not making a trip solely for their benefit.

Anyways, I wanted to check here and hopefully not open a can of worms. Can I fly a friend home if they want to tag along on my trip to save costs, if I have to drop them off at a different airport that is en route anyways?

Thanks in advance!
 
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Thanks for the quick response, just want to make sure that I'm compliant with the FAR
 
The reality is that nobody cares much in most cases.

Common purpose is most narrowly construed as you having a common reason for being in his home town. Perhaps you both want to visit with his parents who you haven't seen in a bit. IMO it would still be common purpose for you to drop him for a much longer visit and have a separate trip the rest of the way to visit your family as well.

The place that this will come up is if you have an incident that attracts the attention of the FAA. A statement from your friend like "Dave said he'd split the cost of the flight with me and drop me to see my parents while he went on to see his" will probably attract some unwanted attention. Semantics are important "Dave and I wanted to see my parents and that's when the incident/accident happened" would likely ring better with the feds
 
airheadpenguin said:
The reality is that nobody cares much in most cases.

Common purpose is most narrowly construed as you having a common reason for being in his home town. Perhaps you both want to visit with his parents who you haven't seen in a bit. IMO it would still be common purpose for you to drop him for a much longer visit and have a separate trip the rest of the way to visit your family as well.

The place that this will come up is if you have an incident that attracts the attention of the FAA. A statement from your friend like "Dave said he'd split the cost of the flight with me and drop me to see my parents while he went on to see his" will probably attract some unwanted attention. Semantics are important "Dave and I wanted to see my parents and that's when the incident/accident happened" would likely ring better with the feds
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Thanks. I see you're from NH, what part? My destination would be KBML, small world.
 
airheadpenguin said:
The reality is that nobody cares much in most cases.

Common purpose is most narrowly construed as you having a common reason for being in his home town. Perhaps you both want to visit with his parents who you haven't seen in a bit. IMO it would still be common purpose for you to drop him for a much longer visit and have a separate trip the rest of the way to visit your family as well.

The place that this will come up is if you have an incident that attracts the attention of the FAA. A statement from your friend like "Dave said he'd split the cost of the flight with me and drop me to see my parents while he went on to see his" will probably attract some unwanted attention. Semantics are important "Dave and I wanted to see my parents and that's when the incident/accident happened" would likely ring better with the feds
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The reality is, even if you told them exactly what you did, the worst that would happen would be a talk followed by "don't do that again" and that would end it. The FAA doesn't have the time nor the desire to chase stuff like this.
 
RotorAndWing said:
The reality is, even if you told them exactly what you did, the worst that would happen would be a talk followed by "don't do that again" and that would end it. The FAA doesn't have the time nor the desire to chase stuff like this.
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but but...Ron said...........
 
RotorAndWing said:
The reality is, even if you told them exactly what you did, the worst that would happen would be a talk followed by "don't do that again" and that would end it. The FAA doesn't have the time nor the desire to chase stuff like this.
Click to expand...

Yeah, probably the same with many of the 'hypothetical' questions posted on here.
 
Assuming you want an answer to the question "what is permitted" rather than "what can I get away with..." (since ignorance is not a defense anyway, it's probably best to try to understand a rule before deciding it's ok to break it) this is kind of a general overview that may or may not apply to your specific situation.

It's interesting you refer to "common destination" as the most "conservative" reading. The long-standing requirement is for a common "purpose" which, in very recent years has been substantially liberalized to at least a common destination.

When you drop a friend off somewhere else, it sounds like it "should" be OK but at that point, you really have neither a common destination nor a common purpose. You have a flight in which you are transporting someone to where the friend wants to go and the friend is paying in part for it.

Question back at you: Do you agree that if it were an out-and-back flight (KABC-KABC) for you, with the only stop being to drop off your friend and leave, it would not be proper? How does that change just because your personal flight is a one-way cross country?

That may sound a little extreme but consider how the FAA treats landing somewhere in other situations. A commercial pilot may, without an operating certificate, be paid by a professional photographer for taking him up to take photos - so long as they don't land anywhere else. Similarly, the commercial air tours, also without an operating certificate, need to take off and land at the same place, with no intermediate stops. (There are obvious exceptions for emergencies refueling, etc.)

The FAA might look at it more liberally, but in light of recent events, I kind of doubt it.

I'll leave answering "what can you get away with" and "what would be the consequences if the FAA finds out" (which to me depends on how the FAA finds out) to the others.
 
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midlifeflyer said:
Assuming you want an answer to the question "what is permitted" rather than "what can I get away with..." (since ignorance is not a defense anyway, it's probably best to try to understand a rule before deciding it's ok to break it) this is kind of a general overview that may or may not apply to your specific situation.

It's interesting you refer to "common destination" as the most "conservative" reading. The long-standing requirement is for a common "purpose" which, in very recent years has been substantially liberalized to at least a common destination.

When you drop a friend off somewhere else, it sounds like it "should" be OK but at that point, you really have neither a common destination nor a common purpose. You have a flight in which you are transporting someone to where the friend wants to go and the friend is paying in part for it.

Question back at you: Do you agree that if it were an out-and-back flight (KABC-KABC) for you, with the only stop being to drop off your friend and leave, it would not be proper? How does that change just because your personal flight is a one-way cross country?

That may sound a little extreme but consider how the FAA treats landing somewhere in other situations. A commercial pilot may, without an operating certificate, be paid by a professional photographer for taking him up to take photos - so long as they don't land anywhere else. Similarly, the commercial air tours, also without an operating certificate, need to take off and land at the same place, with no intermediate stops. (There are obvious exceptions for emergencies refueling, etc.)

The FAA might look at it more liberally, but in light of recent events, I kind of doubt it.

I'll leave answering "what can you get away with" and "what would be the consequences if the FAA finds out" (which to me depends on how the FAA finds out) to the others.
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Hi Mark,

Yes, I am looking for what the rules allow, not what I can get away with.

However, it seems like if I am making this trip, for my own purpose, it should not be a big deal to drop someone off along the way to share some of the cost. It's not advertising, it's not holding out, and it's not flying for someone else's sole benefit.

But again, I'm new to all this, so it's not my intent to try and justify something that is incorrect, but rather to determine if something is allowed. I understand that if I was flying 50 nmi west, and drop someone off 50 nmi east, that would clearly not be common purpose. But a 200 nmi trip east, dropping someone off 150nmi east in the same flight path, seems a lot more sensible and not contrary to the intent of the law.

Whether or not it is congruent with the law however, still remains as a question to me. ;)
 
ClarksonCote said:
However, it seems like if I am making this trip, for my own purpose, it should not be a big deal to drop someone off along the way to share some of the cost. It's not advertising, it's not holding out, and it's not flying for someone else's sole benefit.
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I agree it "should not" be a big deal. Unfortunately that's not the question.

Look globally rather than specifically. I suggest that because the FAA opinions and NTSB cases are filled with people who came up with, "We'', if I do it =this= way..."

So is there a difference if you decide to do a flight just to fly around for the enjoyment of it, but "just happen to" decide to land at some airport "to drop someone off along the way to share some of the cost"? If you think there is, explain what the difference is. I'll start with the "no difference" side: In both cases, you wen't somewhere you would not have gone if it wasn't for the passenger.

Practically speaking, Rotor and Wing nailed it. There are plenty of cases where the FAA tried the "sin no more" and got resistance. Those typically end up with revoked pilot certificates.

Practically speaking, the FAA is not terribly interested in a lot of this (that's the "will I get caught piece." What makes them interested are accidents, complaints from Part 135 operators who see a trip with a different "friend' every week. In those cases, the rules are grey and the real test is "if it quacks like a duck..." And if the duck says it's really a charter under the guise of expense sharing, the FAA will find a way.

It's not about advertising or holding out. It's about transportation in exchange for a benefit. You know, "drop someone off [somewhere] to share some of the cost."
 
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ClarksonCote...

As you've noticed by now, you won't find a straight shooting, solid answer. Mainly because FAA doesn't want there to be one.

If you're unaware, Mark is a practicing attorney. And if it takes three pages to explain the options by Mark, it's pretty obvious the law is expressly and purposefully broken, surrounding this topic.

FAA wants the ability to hang you if you even give a sniff of acting like a Part 135 operation. They can't jive that with the longstanding tradition in our land of freedom of movement and association, utilizing private resources like personally owned aircraft, without hanging a very strange set of rules around it, and then letting their own Chief Counsel move the goalposts when convenient for political winds and leaving enforcement actions up to an inspector who make have had bad heartburn the night before and is cranky. Haha. Or whatever.

It's an unanswerable question, because it's purposefully vague law.

You get to decide what a bunch of people will say at trial, after you ball it up with your friend on board and kill or injure him or her -- or even just substantially damage the aircraft.

Otherwise it's unlikely but not impossible, that anyone would even know it occurred.

Most "classic" aircraft manufacturer advertising from yesteryear touts the "businessman pilot" happily carting co-workers merrily to their personal destinations without any cares about this stuff. That's not the legal environment we live in today, for better or for worse. Note the lack of similar ads today, for the most part.

If you want a guarantee of no legal issues, toss them in the car and drive them there over icy roads and with bald tires. Perfectly legal. You may incur Civil liability for negligence, but you'll still have your driver's license.

Toss them in a top notch airplane with a 1000 hour a year private pilot who's more proficient than God himself, and it becomes a legal grey area. Maybe you'll have your certificates at the end, maybe you won't.

Unless you're a Senator who can land on a closed runway and still come out smelling like roses, most folks would find your plan ill-advised.

Flying to a single destination is going to be a lot easier to claim a common purpose than a multiple hop flight. Of course it's all in perception. If you flew to his folk's place and went over and saw them because you've been friends with them since you were a kid, and stayed the night, and then had a completely new leg to fly in the morning to go see your folks... That's different than "drop him off to see his folks". The same trip could be described either way.

The return trip becomes problematic though. Were you really wanting to see his folks again, or just "picking him up to go home"?

It's not going to pass the sniff test at that point.
 
midlifeflyer said:
...Practically speaking, Rotor and Wing nailed it. There are plenty of cases where the FAA tried the "sin no more" and got resistance. Those typically end up with revoked pilot certificates.
"
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Yep. The whole "compensation or hire" and "common purpose" are painted with a very broad brush and intentionally vague which allows each FSDO inspector some latitude in how they deal with it. How the offending pilot deals with the FSDO can determine the outcome.
 
How about if he buys fuel at his friend's destination?
 
Palmpilot said:
How about if he buys fuel at his friend's destination?
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That was my other curiosity, haha.

Thank Mark and others, quickly realizing the answer won't be simple and straightforward, which I somewhat expected I suppose. I guess I can always drop them off for free, then there is no issue... Correct?
 
ClarksonCote said:
That was my other curiosity, haha.

Thank Mark and others, quickly realizing the answer won't be simple and straightforward, which I somewhat expected I suppose. I guess I can always drop them off for free, then there is no issue... Correct?
Click to expand...

Based on an actual case decision, carrying someone for free can be an issue if it creates goodwill in furtherance of a business relationship. And based on the plain language of the regulation, if the passenger pays someone other than the pilot for the flight, that's an issue even if the pilot doesn't get paid.
 
Another possibility is that if the passenger's destination has a restaurant on the field, the pilot might want to go there to eat, giving him a purpose for being at that destination.

I'm not an attorney, by the way, just kibitzing.
 
Flying a friend occasionally,that's what friends are for. No need to get the FAA involved.
 
midlifeflyer said:
The long-standing requirement is for a common "purpose" which, in very recent years has been substantially liberalized to at least a common destination.
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So, there cannot be more than one "common purpose" per flight? And if more than one common purpose does exist, the FAA gets to choose the one that's least favorable?

dtuuri
 
dtuuri said:
So, there cannot be more than one "common purpose" per flight? And if more than one common purpose does exist, the FAA gets to choose the one that's least favorable?
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Whichever one looks best to an ALJ, that's what the lawyer will choose. Why not? They'd be crazy to allow someone to claim there's more than one purpose to life.

We all know if it got that far and an inspector didn't want to stop it, that's exactly what a lawyer would argue.

Remember, it's not about common sense. It's about the law. They are only loosely related. Most lawyers learn this in their first year in law school.
 
So if the passenger didn't kick in for any expense, would any of this matter?
 
Pick him up on the way to the airport and charge him $200 for the ride. Let him fly for free.
 
ClarksonCote said:
Hi all, new private pilot here, and I have a question about cost sharing...

I am interested in renting a plane to visit family 200nmi away. I'd like to potentially share the cost with other people. However, I want clarification on the full definition of what is considered "common purpose"

For example, I have a friend who grew up about 75% of the way to my destination. I would like to land there on the way to my hometown, drop them off, and continue.

The most conservative definition of common purpose is the same destination, but legally many places say that common purpose is like carpooling back from college with people, and I've certainly done that too (and dropped people off along the way). I also looked up definitions of common purpose, and it sounds like dropping a friend off while I'm already en route would fit (our common purpose is a weekend visit to our homes). And I'm flying to my hometown anyway, not making a trip solely for their benefit.

Anyways, I wanted to check here and hopefully not open a can of worms. Can I fly a friend home if they want to tag along on my trip to save costs, if I have to drop them off at a different airport that is en route anyways?

Thanks in advance!
Click to expand...

What you're describing sounds fine to me. You're not holding yourself out as some kind of ppl who will fly someone someplace whenever or wherever. You know your pax, it's a trip you'd make either way.

Yes, this is a textbook case of what cost sharing is meant to allow.
 
Palmpilot said:
Based on an actual case decision, carrying someone for free can be an issue if it creates goodwill in furtherance of a business relationship. And based on the plain language of the regulation, if the passenger pays someone other than the pilot for the flight, that's an issue even if the pilot doesn't get paid.
Click to expand...
I personally (now that Nate blew my cover :mad2:, I have to toss in a disclaimer that this isn't legal advice) really wouldn't worry to much about that stupid Mr. Ed's Superbowl party case.

The case involves a Super Bowl party at a commercial establishment. The charge included transportation. There's some indication in the case that the bar had made charter arrangements that fell through. In steps William Murray, a private pilot, and does multiple trips to transport the patrons. Supposedly, Murray charged and received nothing for his efforts. The FAA argued, and the NTSB agreed, that Murray's expectation of later "business good will" was sufficient compensation to bring him under the prohibition.

There's a number of things going on in the case. I've often been tempted to write a long blog post on it. But just two:

1. First and foremost it's a case about the "duck" test. This is so obviously a grey charter of the exact type the rules are designed to avoid - multiple flights transporting patrons of a commercial enterprise who paid for the flight. Finding out about it (we don't know how) the FAA was going to do something about it. Especially since Murray was apparently ahead of time that what he was doing violated the FARs.

2. It shows the lengths to which the FAA and NTSB will go to get at quacking activity. I call the case stupid because the FAA went the ridiculous "good will is compensation" route rather than "PIC on a flight for compensation" route. I suspect there were some evidentiary problems that led to the FAA's decision to take that tack.
 
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ClarksonCote said:
That was my other curiosity, haha.

Thank Mark and others, quickly realizing the answer won't be simple and straightforward, which I somewhat expected I suppose. I guess I can always drop them off for free, then there is no issue... Correct?
Click to expand...
Put it this way: If I were going somewhere anyway and could do someone a favor and drop if off along the way, I would do it happily and wouldn't ask him to pay for it.
 
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