GAO STUDY FINDS THAT AIRLINE POLICIES FOR CONTRACTING OUT MAINTENANCE REMAIN CONSISTENT
September 8, 2016
The Federal Aviation Administration, which is responsible for overseeing nearly 4,800 FAA-certificated repair stations (both in the United States and abroad), recently tasked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) with performing a comprehensive review of maintenance contracting trends and FAA oversight of repair stations. GAO’s report, published last month, assesses: (1) trends and factors that influence airline maintenance; (2) FAA’s oversight of foreign and domestic repair stations; and (3) efforts taken by FAA to improve its risk-based oversight. In preparing its report GAO analyzed BTS data on maintenance spending from 2010-2014 by certain U.S. commercial airlines. GAO also conducted interviews, visited multiple foreign repair stations, and analyzed FAA inspection and enforcement data for repair stations during the same time period.
After conducting this research GAO determined that the amount of aircraft maintenance contracted out to domestic and foreign repair stations (as opposed to being performed in-house) has remained relatively steady from 2010 through 2014. GAO’s report indicates that annual contracted maintenance spending ranged from 58 to 64 percent of total annual maintenance spending for the airlines surveyed. GAO also reported that the type of aircraft maintenance can affect an airline’s decision to contract out maintenance. For example, GAO notes that airlines generally indicated that the majority of light, routine maintenance is performed in-house while more complicated maintenance and repairs are typically outsourced. Representatives interviewed by GAO during the course of its study identified three key influencing factors that may affect airline maintenance decisions: (1) service quality available at repair stations; (2) cost considerations; and (3) the use of service contracts with OEMs.
The GAO report recommended that FAA should: (1) develop and implement a process for incorporating data for U.S. airlines’ maintenance contracted to repair stations into FAA’s Safety Assurance System (SAS); and (2) develop a process to evaluate the effectiveness of SAS.
If you have any questions, please contact Evelyn Sahr (esahr@eckertseamans.com, 202-659-6622) or Drew Derco (dderco@eckertseamans.com, 202-659-6665).
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