Aircraft owners, take notes. Here is a piece of software that if used well, can save you big money.

All to often aircraft owners complain that they don't know where the money goes, that their plane seems like a black hole absorbing their dollars. What with so many incidentals, interest rates, overheads, and employees, it's easy to lose track of exactly how much is spent on what.

Well, finally, there is a solution. Air Power Software has just released the Interactive Budget Analyzer, a user-friendly piece of software that allows aircraft owners to easily break down their annual operating costs, and analyze the results.

The Budget Analyzer's main window, though somewhat cluttered, is a basic layout of expense fields that can be customized. Each of these fields is automatically incorporated into the entire operating cost.

As examples, the Budget Analyzer has the budgets of 175 popular aircraft preloaded, and organized into Jets, Turbo Props, Pistons, and Helicopters. The specific costs for each aircraft were derived from multiple sources, and then averaged to achieve working numbers.

Each preloaded aircraft includes average operating numbers for gallons per hour used, annual maintenance expenses, hangar expenses, insurance expenses with variable liability premiums, and average crew salaries including benefits.

But this feature is more than a tutorial. The preloaded budgets allow owners to compare their own budgets to the average, and allow potential buyers to assess annual operating cost before buying.

Of course, each aircraft's figures vary according to personal operational techniques, environment, and fly-time, and for this reason, the Budget Analyzer allows users to enter their own numbers into each of these fields, and more.

Once all the fields are completed, the Budget Analyzer creates a comprehensive picture of the annual operating cost of the aircraft. The breakdown can be viewed in a variety of different charts and graphs, which make it easy to see where costs need to be trimmed.

Numerous aircraft budgets can be saved and compared to each other, which is again helpful for owners and non-owners alike.

For the investment-minded, the Budget Analyzer has a Depreciation Schedule, which adjusts the value of an aircraft over 5 and 7-year period according to MACRS rates. There is also a Trip Cost Calculator, which allows for the easy calculation of the time and cost of a trip.

If the Budget Analyzer leaves anything to be desired, it is simply a more polished look. The colors used to denote various fields are garish, and the layout is a bit cluttered, though by no means unusable.

This software is unique in its ability to easily provide a comprehensive picture of both total costs and individual expenses to the aircraft operator, and while the software itself doesn't hold the secrets to saving money, it presents the numbers in such a way that it becomes easy to see where costs can be cut. Priced at only $199 for two licenses, this is one investment you can be sure will not depreciate.

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