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A Rant About Jeppesen's Trip Kit

lluciani

lluciani

Active Member
I called Jeppesen last week and found out a one time Nav data update for my Garmin 430 costs $110. They call it a "trip kit" and it is good for 28 days. I rarely fly for-real IFR. I love my 430 but the per-IFR-trip cost of keeping it up-to-date is outrageous.

Luis Luciani
RV8, N188LC
 
I know the feeling.

Had a similar experience with a King GPS, but even higher prices because they use proprietary data.

My only suggestion is to check with Jeppesen on their subscription policy.

With King, it was outrageous for 1 update, as you note, but if you got a "1 year" (13 cycle) subscription, the per-cycle price was much more reasonable (like around $450 for the whole year, IIRC).

What I'm not sure about is if the subscription has a date-based expiration. If not, you could pay for a year but only take the updates when you need them instead of every 28 days.
 
lluciani said:
I called Jeppesen last week and found out a one time Nav data update for my Garmin 430 costs $110. They call it a "trip kit" and it is good for 28 days. I rarely fly for-real IFR. I love my 430 but the per-IFR-trip cost of keeping it up-to-date is outrageous.

Luis Luciani
RV8, N188LC
Click to expand...

If you have a friend at the airport who has a subscription, see if he'll agree to rotate cards with you. (offer to do the update for him) Put the current cards in his, and the old card (one cycle out of date) in yours.

For VFR flying, the database doesn't have to be current, as long as you've verified the info (i.e. the frequencies and fixes you'll be using). You can't legally fly a GPS approach without current data though...

We keep two 430s up to date in a Cirrus, and share a hangar with two VFR helicopters that are equipped with 430s. Each month, we pull the data cards out of the helos, update them on the laptop, and swap them into the Cirrus. The old cards from the Cirrus go into the VFR helos, which are never more than a month out of date.

a painless (but not free) way to keep up to date for trips is aeroplanner.com
 
The cost of doing business

lluciani said:
I called Jeppesen last week and found out a one time Nav data update for my Garmin 430 costs $110. They call it a "trip kit" and it is good for 28 days. I rarely fly for-real IFR. I love my 430 but the per-IFR-trip cost of keeping it up-to-date is outrageous.

Luis Luciani
RV8, N188LC
Click to expand...

I have to disagree with "outrageous." There is a lot of data on that little card and it takes a lot of work to compile the information. The subscription for my 430 is $325 a year for 13 updates covering the whole US. The same coverage on paper is $1024.

I agree "flyeyes," consider working a deal with someone with a subscription.

John Clark
RV8 N18U "Sunshine"
KSBA
 
In the airline biz, we get paper revisions about once every two weeks for our Jeppesen manuals. I was told recently that each one of those packets for each pilot costs around $20!! So roughly 26 revisions per year @ $20/ ea. x 6500 pilots... Yikes!:eek:

cost of doing business I suppose...
 
John Clark said:
I have to disagree with "outrageous." There is a lot of data on that little card and it takes a lot of work to compile the information.
Click to expand...
Yes, but who pays to collect the data? Doesn't that map data come from the US Government. Meaning aren't we paying to develop the data anyway and all they are doing it converting it to their format?

BTW, it was $30 to update my 496 at SnF. Ah, the joys of flying VFR.
 
N941WR said:
Yes, but who pays to collect the data? Doesn't that map data come from the US Government. Meaning aren't we paying to develop the data anyway and all they are doing it converting it to their format?
Click to expand...
There was a big row several years ago about NOAA trying to restrict the free distribution of much of its data. Basically, NOAA was trying not distribute any kind of product that you could buy commercially as a "value-added" item. There was a general outpouring of anger this and NOAA finally relented. The commercial WX vendors tried to keep the policy - they were making money selling data that would otherwise be available for free.

Fortunately, we have services like NACOmatic that are free or low cost. We also have the choice between free aviation weather services like ADDS (or Doug's VAF weather pages) and value-added services like Weathermeister that take free data and make it more useful. The same is true with charts - we can buy NACO charts for cheap (or download for free!) or pay for Jepps.

The key is that we have a choice. We need to vigilant to ensure we continue to have free/at-cost access to data that was created with public funds.

Slightly off topic, but I am reminded by a quote of Robert A. Heinlein:

There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country the notion that because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute or common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back.​
TODR
 
Jeppesen

N941WR said:
Yes, but who pays to collect the data? Doesn't that map data come from the US Government. Meaning aren't we paying to develop the data anyway and all they are doing it converting it to their format?
Click to expand...

Having toured the Jeppesen facility in Colorado, I don't think it is quite that simple. They have over 3000 employees.

John Clark
RV8 N18U "Sunshine"
KSBA
 
Stealing a subscription (which is really what you are doing when you 'share') will only continue to drive these prices up. $110 for a database subscription that you will use for a whole entire year? It's the cost of doing business/pleasure.

How much did your last top off cost you?

The only thing cheap in aviation are pilots and airplane owners! :D
 
the_other_dougreeves said:
There was a big row several years ago about NOAA trying to restrict the free distribution of much of its data. Basically, NOAA was trying not distribute any kind of product that you could buy commercially as a "value-added" item. There was a general outpouring of anger this and NOAA finally relented. The commercial WX vendors tried to keep the policy - they were making money selling data that would otherwise be available for free.
Click to expand...

This was Senate bill 786 (2005). It was never passed. It wasn't NOAA pushing it, it was Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA).

It would have prohibited NOAA/NWS from giving away any information that could be provided by the private sector, emergency alerts excluded. It would have shut down all of the NOAA weather broadcast radio channels, removed the basic forcasts and removed the radar and satellite images from their website (in spite of the fact that their radar images are BY FAR the best on the web).

Yes, if this bill would have passed your tax dollars would have funded NOAA which then would have given the data to the Weather Channel, etc which would make money by showing ads and giving it to you.
 
Geronimo4497 said:
Stealing a subscription (which is really what you are doing when you 'share') will only continue to drive these prices up. $110 for a database subscription that you will use for a whole entire year? It's the cost of doing business/pleasure.
Click to expand...

Read his post again. It's only good for 28 days, not a whole year.
 
Geronimo4497 said:
Stealing a subscription (which is really what you are doing when you 'share') will only continue to drive these prices up. $110 for a database subscription that you will use for a whole entire year? It's the cost of doing business/pleasure.
Click to expand...

I don't think anyone is advocating "stealing" a subscription.

Loading the data onto multiple devices at the same time would violate the terms of service, but that's not what we're talking about.

The costs are high, in part, because there is no real competition on the industry. Jeppesen makes a good product for the most part, but they are horribly inefficient and their customer service is abysmal.

I own sixgadgets which take Jepp databases and have subscriptions for four of them. The others (396 and 496) I update occasionally for VFR.

We have a dual Garmin 430 installation, and they have to have identical databases or they won't talk to each other and crossfeed flight plans. It would make more sense to update them one at a time, and leave the #2 garmin with the old, known good database, but that would crimp the revenue stream.

We have had corrupted updates which made the G430 useless until they were re-updated.
 
Jamie said:
Read his post again. It's only good for 28 days, not a whole year.
Click to expand...


I inferred from his post that he would buy a one time subscription (valid IFR approach ops for 28 days) and use it for the whole year. I may be misunderstanding this. It happens all of the time. :eek:
 
Geronimo4497 said:
Stealing a subscription (which is really what you are doing when you 'share')
Click to expand...

Sorry, but I believe you have it wrong.

They are paying for a new, current update, and then they are taking the old, no longer current info, and giving it away.

Kinda like giving away a newspaper the day after you have read it.

To copy the current info, and pass that along might be considered "stealing".

The outdated info is effectively trash to an IFR pilot, but is very useful to a VFR pilot in a "recycle" sense.
 
Jeppesen a 9,000lb gorilla.. We need open source data. I know in Jepp's database of errors freq changes etc no way to change or note. I Would also like to remove nav aids that are down via notam and closed airports etc. I would also like to add handler frequencies to an airport.

Example, ALDAN intersection just outside of Iceland has 2 names 1 for inbound and 1 for outbound Jeppesen has not noted or changed this. Unless you know or have a paper chart (non Jeppesen) one can get confused easily.


I use their Internet flight planner for international the cost of 1 trip kit charts only it pays for it self.


Also look at this page wow!!!! Lots of bad data or changed data.

http://www.jeppesen.com/wlcs/index.jsp?section=resources&content=publications_navdata.jsp
 
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it's kind of BS that you have to pay the same high price multiple times to "own" the rights to the same intellectual property for multiple devices.


Jeppesen's software prevents you from flashing current updates onto more than one card. Thank god for them there's no way around THAT, right? RIGHT?! :rolleyes:
 
Jamie said:
This was Senate bill 786 (2005). It was never passed. It wasn't NOAA pushing it, it was Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA).
Click to expand...

And for even more backstory - one of Rick Santorum's major donors and the real pusher for this bill was Accuweather. Accuweather wanted to get NOAA data but make sure they could sell it to the public without the 'free' competition.

Jerks.

;-)
 
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