FAA revises system for issuing student pilot certificates

The AOPA-backed changes to IACRA that went into effect Nov. 3 also make it easier to conduct the so-called birthday solos that were restored last July after several months of unavailability.

Student pilots who have not yet reached their fourteenth birthday will be able to apply for their student pilot certificate through IACRA, with an authorized individual, no earlier than 90 days before the their fourteenth birthday. Once the application is approved and vetted, IACRA will send an email notification instructing the student to log back into his or her IACRA console to print the temporary student pilot certificate.

When the FAA restored the ability to solo on the student’s fourteenth or sixteenth birthday—depending on the solo privileges sought—the FAA required the student to submit a paper application to receive the certificate in a timely manner. The IACRA update now in effect will allow students to apply in IACRA, but the temporary student pilot certificate will not be printable from the console or made available until the student's fourteenth birthday.

“AOPA requested that the FAA make the temporary student pilot certificate available through IACRA,” said Justin Barkowski, AOPA director of regulatory affairs.

A rule the FAA issued last January, which took effect April 1, changed the process for obtaining a student pilot certificate by making it no longer possible to receive the ticket from an aviation medical examiner. Instead, students were required to apply through IACRA, with an authorized individual also signing the application, and wait for a permanent student pilot certificate to arrive in the mail.

“After the rule took effect, AOPA received a number of member complaints about processing times, with some applicants waiting weeks for a certificate,” Barkowski said.

The FAA has been working to expedite the processing and mailing of permanent student pilot certificates. With the newly effective IACRA update, “the time between applying and printing a temporary certificate should not be longer than a week,” he said.