08/01/23 could be 8th January – or 1st August.
As most people know, English (including Australian and New Zealand) date formats are different from American date formats.
The standard English format puts the day first and the month second, while the American format puts the month first and the day second.
CAA Airworthiness Inspector Robert Van Asch, says confusion between the two is emerging as a problem for compliance, and for maintenance reminders.
“If you need, for instance, to comply with an FAA airworthiness directive, or you’re doing a biennial flight review, and you think you need to do this on say, 3 August, you might actually have needed to have done it back on 8 March.”
In fact, this exact problem occurred when a pilot’s BFR was due on 11 August 2022, but it was set in the calendar as 8 November 2022 – that is, 11/08/22 was set as 08/11/22 and the BFR was missed.
Robert says this problem can also occur when dates are logged in the aircraft tracking programme with an American default date format, or the logbook from source documentation using the American date format.
“So take the time to check exactly on which date you need to act. It might save you the embarrassment, at the least, of flying without a BFR, and therefore without a licence, and it might save you from operating with an overtime component.”