Hey JSFBoat,

I highly recommend Bristol Groundschool. I used them and you have the option to have them send you all 14 subjects from the beginning or you can just have them send you the first 8 and you can get the other six later, either in person or by royal post.

You can get the books and then you can sit their brushup course and take the exams whenever you are ready. I bought my books in June of 2009 and didn't actually start studying until September of 2010, sat the two week brushup and exams for the first 8 exams in November/December 2010, with mod 2 only a couple months afterwards. If you already have your FAA ATP, then you don't have to sit the brushups and you can self certify for the exams. There were a couple guys in my brushups who already had FAA ATPs and didn't sit through all of the brushups or switched between mod1 and mod2 subjects.

There are two other really good providers in the UK, Oxford which is the most expensive, and CATS which is the cheapest of the three but split up the subjects into three modules, but I've only used Bristol so I can't say if the other two are good or bad, but I haven't heard anything bad about them.

Also, these three are distance learning providers. If you wanted to do the learning in-house, I could give some references but I can't imagine you want to spend 8 months in ground school with PPL holders trying to get their CPLs. If you look anywhere else, avoid anyone using Nordian books, I've heard they are atrocious.

The one advantage of doing CATS is that they have a brushup ground school location in Florida, and there is one UK CAA testing center in Florida, so if you are going to do the conversion from the states before you move, that might be to your advantage. The CATS system uses three modules, each module has 1 week of brushup followed by one week of testing, so six weeks in total if you sit through the whole brushup. Bristol uses two modules, each module uses two weeks of brushup ground school followed by one week of testing, so also six weeks in total. Their Brushup course is held in Cheddar Village, near Bristol UK. Lots of RAF and Royal Army pilots using the Bristol groundschool. There were several in both of my modules.

All three distance learning providers do the ground school on your computer. With Bristol (the one I have experience with), you can read the material on your computer (it is identical to what is in your books), and then there are quizzes and progress tests. Once you are finished, you go to Bristol for your two weeks of brushup, then to one of the testing centers for taking your exams. The UK CAA only holds exams once a month, each exam costs 68 GBP.

Your your licence must be issued in the same country as your initial medical (revalidation of medical can be done in any JAA country), and your exams must be done in the same country as your licence issue. so basically, you have to do everything in the same country unless you get an agreement from the different countries (UK and Ireland already have a standing agreement, and Greece accepts the UK Exams. France will accept the UK exams for a fee and paperwork). The UK CAA allows you to do your initial medical in another JAA country, but you have to do paperwork and pay a fee, and I have a friend who did this after getting his medical in Rome, and he is ON A WAITING LIST for the UK CAA to process his medical.

I don't know about any distance learning providers in Germany, but I heard that the ATPL exams there are fill in the blank. If you get a UK JAA licence, you can transfer it to Germany after 180days of residency in Germany (JAA/EASA rules).

But overall, I can't recommend Bristol Groundschool enough, the only ones who don't get first time passes in all subjects are the ones who didn't put in the effort. Let me know if you have any more questions. I just went through conversion process recently.

Lastly, several companies within the Lufthansa group are hiring, I donīt speak German (one of their hiring requirements) or else they would be on my most desired list. If you get your license in the UK, the Lufthansa group still requires a JAA Class 1 Initial medical completed in Germany in addition to one you got in the UK.