Not true (see noygonnadoit's post above).

If you repo an airplane for someone else, they benefit from that. Add some compensation (possibly the flight time itself) and you are a pilot for hire.

If you rent an airplane for your purposes, the owner does NOT benefit from that flying...you are just wearing out his airplane for him. In fact, odds are really high that you had to pay HIM not vice versa.

So if an airplane owner/ flight school/ FBO offers you the option to fly an airplane to another airport for annual/ maint. or repostition for whatever reason, and they have arranged a return ride for you. That would be considered compensation?

Wow, I would never have guessed since money didn't exchange hands.

Not in the FAA sense. You are being paid for your non-flying work with free flight time. You are not being compensated for flying. It's compensation for flying that the FAA is trying to regulate.

Practically speaking, here's what I think is going on. The FAA is trying to do two things with these regs - (1) protect the public that has no way of telling who's qualified and who isn't other than by the pilot or operating certificate they hold; and (2) protect those who made the effort and paid the money to get those advanced certificates. OTOH, people are always trying to find their way around the regs, so the lines are intentionally fuzzy and sometimes the FAA comes up with all sorts of contortions that ultimately come down to "if it quacks like a duck..."

Be careful. FAA could just as easily consider the OP to be acting as a corporate pilot, which requires a commercial license. Trying to separate his normal duties from flying might well be problematic in court. There are several good posts above regarding "free flight time" as compensation. I think one would have to survey historic cases and see how the FAA was applying - and reacting to - these various situations to get a "correct" answer here. For the specific (and long moot, I'm sure) case above, it's hardly worth the effort.

AOPA and ALPA both have lists of aviation attorneys that could check on this. With all respect to everyone, don't rely on legal advice from here! :D

Depends. I was reading the post to say that he had a non-flying job with a FBO (let's say as a bookkeeper) and as a bonus, was given free flight time to use personally, not for company business.

But I agree with you completely - in the case of any real scenario about whether something you are doing or planning to do is legal, it's best to get competent professional advice. I've looked at a couple of NTSB decisions and still haven't found one that said "some guy on the Internet told me it was ok" was a viable defense.

If you're getting paid whether you fly the plane or not I believe that is a textbook definition of compensation being "incidental" to the flight.

Just make sure you're by yourself or with another certificated pilot and I can't see how you're violating any regulations.

Nope, this is not incidental. This is the reason for the flight. It is a repo flight for mx, right? How is the OP getting to fly the plane free incidental. Flying to a meeting is incidental. Now if the FBO were to give a "bonus" on his W2 and taxes were paid. Then decucted the bonus amount for the flight expense...

Tough call I suppose. You can take the advice of others here and maybe call the FSDO for clarification, or contact an aviation attorney. There are several valid points for either argument, so clearly it's a gray area.

My thought: it's not worth the trouble for a 10nm flight. What's that going to add to your logbook? 0.3? Maybe 0.5 if you taxi really slow and do a super thorough run-up? Not worth it. And if your employer is pressuring you to do it, take warning. There are likely several commercial rated pilots and CFIs hanging around who are available and willing to ferry this airplane. Why aren't they doing it?

If he flies the plane he gets paid his wage for his general duties.

If he doesn't fly the plane he gets paid his wage for his general duties.

This is no different than a traveling technician who is on a salary. He can fly all over the country for his job and even though he is paid a salary of X-amount per a 40hr work week which is generally 9 - 5. That doesn't violate any FARs, like a demo pilot for example. He can demo the plane to an owner and not pay for the time...blah blah blah. Otherwise he would have to fly after 5 or before 9 since he's "getting paid while flying".

Bottom line, since he would get paid if he didn't fly that means the pay is incidental to the flight.

I agree that his salary (that he was going to get anyway) is not likely to be considered compensation, but the flight time itself could be compensation if he's a time builder.