June 8, 2015

Connections made at the association’s premier event can have immediate business impact: A member attending this year’s Annual Repair Symposium successfully eliminated an unnecessary review of its foreign repair station.

After taking note of the FAA’s declared effort to reduce redundant audits, the member queried the agency about an upcoming audit of a facility located in Europe that performs maintenance for an U.S. air carrier. The FAA responded to the query within a matter of days, confirming that the audit was both directly contrary to the United States/European Bilateral Aviation Safety Agreement (BASA) Maintenance Implementation Procedures (MIP) and to agency efforts to reduce redundant audits.

The Annual Repair Symposium offers one venue for members to learn and interact with regulators and colleagues, but ARSA keeps its ear on the ground to stay apprised of these types of issues affecting its members year-round. Currently, ARSA is collecting responses to a survey to determine the audit burden placed on the contract maintenance industry. The results will quantify issues of common concern regarding the untenable reality of non-stop, overlapping, and duplicative audits.

Please take the time to provide your company’s at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2015AuditsSurvey.

Member participation is critical to ARSA’s success, and – as highlighted by one member’s elimination of a duplicative audit based upon information received at the 2015 Annual Repair Symposium – it is critical to member companies’ success too.