UK CAA to charge the drone/model community £362,000 more next year.
Drone/model aircraft operator registration alone earns the CAA almost £2m per annum. But, apparently that’s not enough.
From the 1st of April 2023, the UK regulator intends to increase its price for registration by 13.5%. And with its rounding-up policy, that takes the price from £10 to £12 – actually making it a 20% increase.
That will cost the UK drone/model flying community an extra £362,000 from April 22 to April 23 – taking the total to £2.2m per annum!
This increase follows an 11% increase from £9 to £10 last year.
If you would like to give the CAA your views on this price increase, you can reply to the CAA’s consultation here: https://consultations.caa.co.uk/finance/caa-charges-23-24/.
Don’t put it off, though. The ‘CAA Statutory Charges Consultation 2023 – 2024 consultation‘ closes very soon.
* Based on the 181,161 registered operators. CAA July 2022.
DRONE AND MODEL AIRCRAFT REGISTRATION BACKGROUND
The law requires that all operators of drones and model aircraft with a mass of more than 250g, or under 250g if they have a recording camera, must be registered with the CAA. Each operator is issued with a 19 character Operator ID which they must display on all of their drones and/or model aircraft. The fee was initially £9 per annum. It increased to £10 in 2022, and is now slated to rise again to £12 per annum from 1st April 2023. For further information about drone and model aircraft registration please see our handbook – handbook.fpv.uk
FPV UK members can register with the CAA automatically through their FPV UK account. Just press the ‘Add CAA Registration/Renewal’ button within your account and we’ll take care of the rest.
