Questions and answers
Frequently asked questions
The questions that come up most often about seats, costs, verification and cancellations.
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- 13 questions
- The ones asked often enough to be worth writing down.
- Grouped by subject
- Starting out, money, safety, and arranging a seat.
- Answered at length elsewhere
- Every group names the page that covers the same ground in full.
- Or simply ask
- A person answers, and you need no account to write.
Is this a cheap way to fly somewhere?
It is a cheaper way to fly than chartering, and an unreliable way to travel. There is no schedule, and the pilot will call off a flight for weather or a technical fault. Treat it as a flight you would like to make rather than a journey you have to complete.
Do I need an account to look around?
No. The flights, the routes, the fields and the open requests are all readable without one. An account is needed to ask for a seat, to publish one, or to send a message.
Nothing is going where I want to go.
Place a route request. It is visible to every pilot, including the ones without an account, and you are told the moment somebody publishes a flight that fits.
Costs and money
What a seat comes to, who works it out, and who you settle it with.
How cost sharing works →What does a seat cost?
A share of the direct costs of the flight: the hour on the aircraft, the fuel, the landing fees, divided by everybody on board including the pilot. That share is the whole of what a seat costs.
Does the money go through Rightseat?
No. You settle with the pilot directly. Rightseat holds no money and takes no cut.
Is the pilot allowed to do this?
Yes, within the European cost-sharing rules: Article 6(4a) of Regulation (EU) No 965/2012, the air operations rules drawn up by EASA, lets a private pilot share the direct costs of a flight with the people on board — provided they carry their own share, make nothing on it, and no more than six people share the costs. Rightseat checks every published rate against what the flight can cost and refuses the ones that exceed it.
Does the same apply in other countries?
The article is European, so it applies unchanged across the EASA countries. Britain left EASA but carried the same rule into law of its own, enforced there by the Civil Aviation Authority, so a flight to or from a British field works the same way. A national authority can add to the European rule, which is worth checking before you plan a flight that starts abroad.
Safety and responsibility
Who decides whether a flight goes, and what has been checked about the person deciding.
Safety and verification →Who is responsible for the flight?
The pilot in command, entirely. Rightseat operates no flights, judges no weather and has no say in whether one goes ahead.
What has been checked about the pilot?
Proof of identity, a valid licence and a valid medical certificate, and for the aircraft a certificate of registration and an insurance policy. Each is checked and each has an expiry date on file; when one lapses, the pilot can no longer publish a seat.
What if I do not feel safe?
Then do not get in. That feeling needs no further justification and costs you nothing. Afterwards, tell us: pressure to fly, a rate that is really a fare, or anything that made you uncomfortable. We look at every report, and accounts are blocked where that is warranted.
Arranging a seat
What you see before you ask, and how freely either of you can still change your mind.
For passengers →Why can I not see the departure time?
A stranger sees the date and the part of the day. The exact time, the aircraft registration and the pilot’s name appear once you are signed in, because a time to the minute next to a field and a date says rather precisely where one particular aeroplane will be.
Can I still pull out?
Right up to the moment the aircraft moves, and you owe nobody a reason. A seat request is a question rather than a booking, nothing is paid through the platform, and the pilot has the same freedom in the other direction. Tell the pilot through the platform so the seat can go back on the flight.
What if the flight is cancelled?
It happens, and it is usually the right decision. You are told as soon as the pilot cancels, and nothing is owed either way since nothing was paid through the platform.
Still wondering something?
Write to us. Questions asked often enough end up on this page.