Licence Conversions

If you get you licence in South Africa and then want to fly overseas you may have to do a conversion. A lot depends on which country you want to fly in, but with most counties (such as the UK) a South African PPL is valid there.

You can fly a UK registered aircraft in the UK with a South African PPL. This has it’s limitations though. You can not fly commercially and will have to come back to South Africa for medical and licence renewals. There are a number of other options though:

• You can get a licence validation but this is a more temporary option. It allows you to do commercial flying but is usually limited to a year. They can extend it for longer at their discretion. You will also have to come back to South Africa whenever you need to do a licence or medical renewal.
• Do a conversion. You can convert your South African licence to a foreign one. It depends on which country you want to convert your licence to, but in most cases it involves rewriting three of the eight exams and doing a flight test. We can not do his conversion, you would do it at a school in the country you want your licence converted to. This is the best option if you plan to fly in another country for a few years.
• You can fly a South African registered aircraft in a foreign country.

If you are a pilot with a foreign licence we can do the conversion to a South African one at Blue Sky Aviation.

Economical

If you compare the cost of flying helicopters in Europe to South Africa, it is much cheaper to do your licence here and get a conversion back home afterwards than learning to fly in Europe. We also have great weather here so you can do your licence relatively quickly compared to places like Ireland or England where the weather limits your flying.

VAT is charged at 14% in South Africa.

Philip Ploegmakers (Nederland)

Anusha Udas (Nepal)

Matthew Harry (Nigeria)