Opinions on AOPA legal services ?

Hi again,
I am about 10 hours from my Commercial ticket and plan to have my CFI
my the end of the year.

AOPA legal plan would be ~$52/year for Commercial/CFI

Any comments...good/bad/indifferent???

Thanks, Don
Don Byrer
Instrument Pilot Commercial/CFI Student
Electronics Technician, RADAR/Data/Comm @ CLE
Amateur Radio KJ5KB

"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth; now if I can just land without bending the gear..."

Don Byrer wrote:
Hi again,
I am about 10 hours from my Commercial ticket and plan to have my CFI
my the end of the year.
AOPA legal plan would be ~$52/year for Commercial/CFI
Any comments...good/bad/indifferent???

I never had it until two years ago.
Now, I include it with each year's renewal.
It's not just the FAA you have to contend with nowadays.
Without some type of insurance to cover legal advice, the government
will roll over you.

When I went for my FAA interview for my current job the FSDO dude asked
me if I was a member of AOPA. I said yes then he asked if I had the
legal services plan. I said no. He said "get it!". I did.
I fly the ADIZ and FRZ five times a week.
Michelle

Don Byrer wrote:

Hi again,
I am about 10 hours from my Commercial ticket and plan to have my CFI
my the end of the year.

AOPA legal plan would be ~$52/year for Commercial/CFI

Any comments...good/bad/indifferent???

Thanks, Don
Don Byrer
Instrument Pilot Commercial/CFI Student
Electronics Technician, RADAR/Data/Comm @ CLE
Amateur Radio KJ5KB

"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth; now if I can just land without bending the gear..."

Don Byrer wrote:

Any comments...good/bad/indifferent???

I regard it as cheap insurance. The yearly cost wouldn't pay for 15 minutes of a
lawyer's time if I got in trouble.

George Patterson
Give a person a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a person to
use the Internet and he won't bother you for weeks.

Read the fine print. It's useless.


"Don Byrer" wrote in message
...
Hi again,
I am about 10 hours from my Commercial ticket and plan to have my CFI
my the end of the year.

AOPA legal plan would be ~$52/year for Commercial/CFI

Any comments...good/bad/indifferent???

Thanks, Don
Don Byrer
Instrument Pilot Commercial/CFI Student
Electronics Technician, RADAR/Data/Comm @ CLE
Amateur Radio KJ5KB

"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth; now if I can just land without
bending the gear..."

I'm a participating attorney on the plan. I don't know what other
participating attorneys do, but I field at least a call every week from
a pilot, aircraft owner, or other interested aviation person who needs
legal advice. I dispense it free of charge, albeit with the hope that
if it passes beyond that first call, I'll get retained and perhaps
compensated for my efforts.

Just my $.02, but a single half-hour consult at the plan rate of $150
an hour means you're getting $75 of value for your $52.

Blue skies to all,

Darrell Clay
Cleveland, Ohio
http://ifrpilot.blogspot.com

Terry Briggs wrote:
Read the fine print. It's useless.


Care to elaborate?

On 6 Sep 2005 13:57:26 -0700, "
wrote in
.com::

I dispense it free of charge,

Darrell Clay,

Thank you for your input on this matter. But isn't it customary for
the majority of attorneys to provide an initial phone consultation to
potential clients without fee? At least that's been my experience. If
so, what benefit accrues to the AOPA Legal Services plan member for
the fee he pays? I have some idea of the answer to that question, but
I'd like to hear your response. Thanks again.

In article ,
"Terry Briggs" wrote:

Read the fine print. It's useless.




Wow, great comments...

??????

Hmm, I read the fine print and your COMMENTS are worthless!

--
Chris Schmelzer, MD
University of Arizona, UPH Kino

Don,

I am also an attorney on the AOPA legal services plan. My area of
practice is primarily aviation law. Under the terms of the plan I have
had to attend an AOPA legal services seminar within a certain period of
time (the file is at the office so I don't have the details in front of
me) for which I have had to pay. Even though I am actively
representing pilots and mechanics in matters brought by the FAA, the
seminar is almost always very valuable to me and I use information
provided almost immediately.

That being said, my experience is that I get a call from a pilot or
mechanic about once every two weeks or so. Each person calling is
frightened. He (almost invariably he, women are only 6% of pilots and
tend to get in trouble very rarely) has never, ever been in trouble
with the FAA before and has slipped up in some fashion or there has
been a communication problem that has caught the pilot on the short end
of the stick and the FAA is either inquiring into the situation or
actively taking action against the pilot.

The other calls are from pilots who have bought an airplane and didn't
bother to pay for a prebuy inspection and have discovered that they
bought themselves an absolute piece of junk, sight unseen, for a very
low price, from someone a long ways away. And they are ****ed.

Under the terms of the agreement I have signed with the AOPA, I am to
give a certain amount of free consultation to members of the legal
services plan. I don't recall how much time it is, and I don't care,
I'll generally go to an hour in that first phone call, I want to do
what I can for a fellow pilot. About one in five of the callers lie to
me and tell me they are members of the plan. I know I should call and
check on them before I continue the call, but I never do. I check
after the call. Okay, I'm a sucker, but usually the guy is big time
scared and I'm going to do what I can to help him. Besides, the hourly
rate that I get paid through the plan is well below what my firm
insists that I normally charge, so I'm not making much money on the
deal. When I was learning to fly a heck of a lot of guys helped me out
and gave me guidance, so I figure I'm paying them back in some fashion
by helping out pilots now.

If I wind up representing the pilot, I have signed an agreement that
sets the maximum hourly fee I can charge to pilots on the legal
services plan. For pilots not on the plan, I have to charge the fee my
firm sets, which is substantially higher. The thing I've discovered
over the years is that the weak spot in a pilot's defense, especially
where he is clearly not guilty, is the money available to pay for the
defense. (Yes, attorneys do sometimes work for free, but they have to
eat, and the free work is usally for the poor, and unless the pilot is
a young flight instructor, few fit into that category g.)

What I've found is that most of the time, the FAA doesn't bring an
action unless it's got a good case, so it's a challenge defending the
pilot. However, I've also found that the FAA goes for a lot more
penalty than is appropriate, and because the AOPA legal plan pays, I
have the time to work with the pilot to get to the heart of the matter
and find out the circumstances in detail, because there are often more
defenses than are apparent on first examination. Plus, about a third
of the actions are purely political, a professional pilot has gotten on
the wrong side of an FAA inspector and the inspector is just looking
for an excuse to hammer the pilot. (On top of all of that, many pilots
don't call me until after they have spoken to the FAA and have managed
to admit everything, thus taking away any defenses they might well have
honestly had - if the call me early the chances of a successful defense
are far higher and if they know they have money for representation,
they are more likely to call me early, when they first get a call from
the FAA.) So, with some money available to the pilot, I've got the
time to get background information that lets me talk to the FAA
attorney and point out the weak spots in his or her case. Sometimes it
works, sometimes it doesn't. But, the FAA now knows that they are not
going to have walkovers all the time because more and more pilots have
paid the pittance charged by the legal services plan and there will be
an attorney involved who knows the system and is going to keep the FAA
attorney honest. I may not be able to get a violation tossed out
(although that happens about 1 time in 20), but I know I'm going to be
able to get the sanction reduced.

Is it worth it? In my humble opinion, the cost is so very little and
the political environment is so biased against pilots that it's foolish
not to pay that very small cost for what amounts to insurance.

No, I'm not being paid by the AOPA for my comments.

So, as one tightwad pilot to anther: get the damn crowbar out, pry
open your wallet, and pay the fee for the legal services plan. If
nothing else, it's like chicken soup, it can't hurt.

All the best,
Rick