There has been a major change at several of the factory service centers, they will no longer provide the industry standard airworthy / unairworthy list after a prebuy survey. They are only providing a list of “findings”.

The concept is ludicrous to me, but they are the big boys and they can decide how they want to do business.

BUT-

BUYER BEWARE. SELLER BEWARE!

They have made these changes and in some cases are not telling the buyer or seller upfront.

I have been very hesitant to post anything about this, but at this point I have heard numerous reports of airplane deals falling apart because of this practice. That means both the buyer and seller are suffering actual financial loss.

To make this level of change and not notify the parties affected qualifies as dishonest business practices, and it must be immediately exposed. If they do not have the integrity to notify their customers, we in the industry will do it for them.

If you have a Prebuy scheduled at any factory service center, with any manufacturer, be sure to talk to them upfront and make sure you will get a list of airworthiness discrepancies.

Since everyone has a different definition of what's an "airworthiness issue" I'm not surprised.

Just look at annuals from one shop to the next, one will sign off a total s*itheap and the next refuses to sign off with a paint chip.

How was that handled before?

I think it’s a little different in the turbine world, the limitations are in the maintenance manual and pretty clearly defined. The issue seems to be the inspection criteria itself, mainly sellers pushing back and saying the maintenance facility shouldn’t be looking at XYZ, because it isn’t covered in the scope of the prebuy.

More than anything else, it’s a financial ripoff. The shops are doing less work for more money and attempting to absolve themselves of liability at the same time.

Today I was told about a prebuy that blew up because of this, large cabin airplane, the prebuy was $93k, no airworthy / unairworthy list, so the seller refused to fix anything. The rumor is that the buyer will be suing the facility.

Hire the man not the brand

Common mistake

When it comes to my work I like to seek out the individual APIA, I really don’t care about the name of the shop or if they have a fancy coffee machine and a cute secretary, heck as a owner assist guy I steer away from that stuff

A lot of people want the brand pedigree in the logbooks though.

T

I think it’s a little different in the turbine world, the limitations are in the maintenance manual and pretty clearly defined. The issue seems to be the inspection criteria itself, mainly sellers pushing back and saying the maintenance facility shouldn’t be looking at XYZ, because it isn’t covered in the scope of the prebuy.

More than anything else, it’s a financial ripoff. The shops are doing less work for more money and attempting to absolve themselves of liability at the same time.

Today I was told about a prebuy that blew up because of this, large cabin airplane, the prebuy was $93k, no airworthy / unairworthy list, so the seller refused to fix anything. The rumor is that the buyer will be suing the facility.

A lot of people want the brand pedigree in the logbooks though.

T

Help me with this— a large cabin airplane, I’m thinking G500, challenger, falcon with 3 engines etc.-$10 million? $93k is probably not that outside of a norm? Also as an attorney, if client spent $93k and seller was a pill, I’d tell client we could squeeze half of that back. Not seeing that as anything more than rounding error. What facts am I missing?

I want to be very clear that I’m not posting this to tear anyone down, we have brought a lot of business to factory service centers, as Tom pointed out many people want the name in the logbooks. We are usually on the prebuy side, so most folks trust the factory service centers. In some cases the seller won’t allow us to go anywhere else.

Many of my friends work for these companies, one manufacturer in particular I have a lot of friends at, so I’m not trying to disparage the companies, it’s their policies and what they are doing that is wrong.

When it became clear that it seems to be common practice to take in a prebuy without telling the owner or buyer that they aren’t getting what they expected and that the parties are being set up for a lawsuit, I had to say something.

We had a sale killed because the prebuy inspector used the term worn many times.
The plane was 70 yrs old.
Aditionally said was not sure an aileron was airworthy. It had been signed off about thirty times by several different AIs.
Since most sales involve disposition of airworthiness items. Prebuys should be specific in those areas, even if it is noted as an opinion.

How are the company policies and actions not a reflection on the company itself? Disparage away. If they're doing it they need to own it. Making fundamental changes to the way they conduct an inspection that has been more or less standard for decades, without informing the parties involved, is deceitful.

How are the company policies and actions not a reflection on the company itself? Disparage away. If they're doing it they need to own it. Making fundamental changes to the way they conduct an inspection that has been more or less standard for decades, without informing the parties involved, is deceitful.

Sorry man. It's just business in the 21st century. If you are getting a good product or service at a fair price, that just means that they aren't charging you enough.

Fortunately I have not had any issues with repair stations declining to go on record of what is and is not airworthy. I have sometimes had a 100hr inspection plus other specific inspections performed as a pre purchase evaluation (less the Maitenance items, just the inspection portion) if the purchase is consummated, the repair station performs the Maitenance items, makes the required logbook entries thereby going on record that they found everything they inspected to be airworthy


The lesson here is to make sure you are buying what you think you are buying.