What to expect from us
When your application arrives with the CAA, it will undergo a desk-based assessment from a Licensing Officer. For initial issue, first type, additional category and removal of limitation applications, a further assessment will be undertaken by a Technical Standards Surveyor. Following an acceptable assessment your licence will be issued, signed, and despatched.
We will contact you in via telephone or in writing if we have any queries regarding your application and may keep your application on hold until any additional requirements have been met. Please note that applications will only be placed on hold for 30 days before cancellation where no response is received.
An assessment fee will be charged if the CAA rejects your application following assessment by a surveyor where requirements for licence issue have not been met. This fee will also be applied if you choose to cancel your application.
If you are dissatisfied by a decision made by the CAA in relation to your application, you may be entitled to appeal against it or to ask for a review. Please refer to the following webpages for further guidance:
Processing time
Our Service Level Agreement (SLA) for the initial assessment of all applications is 10 working days. Where the application requires assessment by a surveyor, the SLA is 31 working days. This includes 20 working days for the technical assessment of the application, plus an additional day for issue and despatch of the licence.
Where an application is placed on hold, the working days to process the application will be counted from the date of receipt of the requested additional information. Should the application be placed on hold by a surveyor, the new SLA for the application will be 21 working days.
For a small number of applications, a licensing officer may require additional guidance which requires a referral to be made to a technical officer. The technical officer will review the case within 5 working days, however if further advice is needed this will be reviewed at a bi-weekly complex case review session. In such cases the application will take longer to process than our standard turnaround times.
If you are dissatisfied by the service provided to you by the CAA, or wish to raise a complaint regarding a member of staff, our complaints process is detailed on our dedicated complaints webpage.
Due to high application volumes, we are currently experiencing a backlog of applications to be processed, which is also impacting the response times for correspondence. Initial assessments of applications are currently taking 15 working days, with technical assessments completed within 50 working days.
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