How many hours of dual instruction will I need to be covered by my insurance.
Insurance companies have authorized pilots with zero time in a TBM to act as a single pilot PIC; in other instances, they have required pilots receive as much as 100 hours of dual instruction before being allowed to carry passengers. The average is between 5 and 25 hours, depending primarily on your past flying experience.
Long answer:
Insurance underwriting standards vary widely, both as a function of a company’s appetite for the market segment of risk you represent, as well as the underwriter’s perception of where you rank within that market segment. Requesting higher limits of liability, especially with no passenger seat sub-limits, may cause the underwriter to require additional training. Finally some particulars may be negotiable with an experienced agent working on your behalf.
While we will work with your agent and underwriter to ensure your training meets any hourly minimums, Foresight believes assessing your operational risk as a function of flight hours is a poor policy. Foresight trains to a mutually agreed upon (by you, your underwriter, and us) level of proficiency and gives no weight to the number of flight or ground hours the training requires. This documented, objective, measurable, repeatable and transparent proficiency standard is established prior to the commencement of any training. You are then trained to meet or exceed this standard. Completion of your training is documented by Foresight’s detailed ground and flight training records as well as an appropriate training certificate that you will receive upon successful completion of the training.
Naturally, some minimum number of ground and flight hours are needed, even for the most experienced, talented and proficient pilot; simply to allow enough time to test the pilot trainee (PT) to ensure that these standards are met. We think that your insurance company will be more than satisfied with our syllabus, training methods, and completion standards.