Most flight schools start by tracking pilot currency in a spreadsheet, and it works right up until it does not. A spreadsheet never tells you a medical is about to expire, and it never stops a pilot from booking a flight they are not current for. Moving currency tracking into the same system that books your flights fixes both problems at once.

Why spreadsheets fail for currency tracking

A spreadsheet is a list of dates. It does not act on those dates. That is the whole problem. The information is technically there, but nothing happens when a value crosses a deadline, so the work of catching expirations falls back on a person remembering to open the file and read every row.

That breaks down in predictable ways:

  • No one is alerted when a medical, flight review, or checkout is about to lapse.
  • The file lives on one person's machine, or in five slightly different copies.
  • A pilot can book a flight they are not legal for, because the schedule has no idea what the spreadsheet says.
  • Manual entry drifts: typos, blank cells, and dates that never got updated after a renewal.

None of this is a knock on the people doing the tracking. It is what happens when the tool cannot warn you and cannot enforce anything.

What expiration-alert tracking looks like

The difference with real currency tracking software is that the dates do something. Medicals, flight reviews (BFRs), and aircraft checkouts all have expiration dates, and those dates can drive alerts. You hear about an expiration before it happens instead of discovering it on flight day.

Keep it per pilot, in one place

Every pilot should carry their own currency record: medical class and date, last flight review, and the aircraft categories they are checked out in. One record per pilot means no hunting across tabs and no question about which copy is current. When a pilot renews their medical, you update one place and everyone sees it.

Alert before the deadline, not after

An expiration alert is only useful with lead time. Good tracking flags an upcoming medical or BFR well ahead of the date, so the pilot has room to schedule the appointment or the flight review without losing booking privileges. The point is to prevent the lapse, not to report it after the fact.

Check currency at booking time

The real win is checking currency at the moment of booking. If a pilot is out of currency, the system flags it and routes the reservation to staff for approval rather than letting it through. That turns currency from a thing someone remembers to look at into a thing the schedule enforces.

This is where dispatch and currency meet. We cover that overlap in more detail in flight school dispatch and pilot currency, but the short version is simple: the system that books the flight should verify the pilot first, and exceptions should land in a staff queue where a person decides.

What to track at a minimum

  • Medical certificate - class and expiration date.
  • Flight review (BFR) - date of the last review.
  • Aircraft checkouts - the make and model categories each pilot is signed off in.
  • Renter or club requirements - any recurring checks your operation adds on top of the regulations.

Each of these ties to the individual pilot, and each one can carry an expiration that feeds the alert.

How ScheduleFlight does it

ScheduleFlight by FBO Director tracks pilot currency, medicals, and BFRs with expiration alerts, and checks currency at booking time so flagged reservations route to a staff approval queue. It is a responsive web app that runs in any browser today, with native iOS and Android apps coming soon, and it requires an active FBO Director subscription. Founding pricing is 179 dollars per month if you start by August 31, 2026; you can see the details and the 14-day trial on the pricing section.

If you are leaving a system that is going away, our team handles the move for you. See how the assisted migration off MyFBO brings your pilots, instructors, customers, and account numbers across without you rekeying any of it.

Frequently asked questions

Why not just use a spreadsheet for pilot currency?

A spreadsheet never warns you. Currency tracking software sends expiration alerts before a medical, flight review, or checkout lapses, and it can check currency at booking time so pilots cannot book flights they are not current for.

What currency items should a flight school track?

At a minimum, medical certificates, flight reviews (BFRs), and aircraft checkouts, each tied to the individual pilot. Many schools also track their own renter or club requirements on top of that.

When should currency be checked?

At booking time. Checking a pilot's medical, flight review, and checkouts when the reservation is made stops out-of-currency flights before they are ever scheduled.

What happens when a pilot is out of currency?

The reservation is flagged and routed to a staff approval queue, so a person reviews it and decides rather than the booking failing silently or slipping through.