FAA Close to Enacting Re-registration Policy for Aircraft

As soon as this fall, owners could be required to re-register their aircraft with the FAA every three years. The current policy is a one-time registration with a five-dollar fee. The fee for re-registration, if any, has yet to be announced. The re-registration strategy was first proposed two years ago as a means of updating the list of registered aircraft and culling out those that no longer are active. The FAA claims that 104,000 of the currently registered 343,000 aircraft are possibly invalid. If the new rule goes into effect, all owners would have to re-register their aircraft within a three-month window based on the month of their original registration. The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, concerned that fees for re-registering aircraft might be an undue burden on owners, has proposed an online re-registration plan through the existing Triennial Aircraft Registration Report that would serve the same purpose.