AD Compliance at Aircraft Redelivery: The Lessor's Checklist
Redelivery is where a lease agreement meets airworthiness reality. The financial and legal terms may be settled, but the aircraft doesn't move cleanly until its technical status — and its AD position in particular — is established, evidenced, and agreed. A vague or disputed AD status is one of the classic causes of delayed redeliveries, held deposits, and expensive last-minute work.
This checklist covers what to establish about AD compliance at redelivery or lease return, so the aircraft transfers with a clean, defensible airworthiness position.
Why AD status is a redelivery flashpoint
At transfer, both sides care about the same thing from opposite directions: the outgoing party wants to demonstrate the aircraft meets its return conditions; the incoming party wants assurance it isn't inheriting hidden work or gaps. Airworthiness Directives sit right in the middle because they're mandatory, dated, and often recurring — an open or mis-recorded AD can mean the aircraft needs work before it can be accepted, or that its value is impaired until the position is proven.
Get the AD status clean and documented and redelivery is a formality. Leave it fuzzy and it becomes a negotiation.
Lease return conditions and the AD clause
Most leases specify return conditions for airworthiness status, and ADs usually feature explicitly: all applicable ADs complied with, often with a stated margin remaining before the next due point for recurring items, and full compliance evidence provided. The practical implication is that "compliant" isn't enough — you have to be able to show compliance, per tail, with records that will satisfy the incoming operator's CAMO and, ultimately, an authority.
The redelivery AD checklist
Work through this per aircraft:
- Applicable ADs, re-established from source. Don't rely solely on the existing list — confirm applicability against the aircraft's actual type, serial number, modification state, and engine variant, across every relevant authority. Include deduplicated comply-once directives.
- Compliance evidence for each applicable AD. The corrective action, the work record, the date, and the sign-off — linked to the source directive.
- Open and recurring items surfaced. Any AD not yet complied with, and every recurring requirement with its next due point (hours, cycles, or calendar). Recurring items shouldn't be treated as closed.
- Margins against return conditions. For recurring ADs, confirm the remaining margin meets the lease's stated threshold at the redelivery date.
- Cross-jurisdiction check. If the aircraft is changing registry, confirm which authority's directives will apply after transfer and that nothing is missed in the handover between authorities.
- Records completeness. The AD compliance records form part of the aircraft's history — gaps here are gaps in value.
- A reconciled, agreed position. Compare the independently computed status with the record on file, resolve differences, and document the agreed AD status for the transfer.
Back-to-birth and Article 83bis awareness
Two adjacent topics often intersect with redelivery. Back-to-birth traceability — the unbroken record history for life-limited parts and major components — is frequently a return condition in its own right, and AD compliance evidence lives within that record chain. And where an aircraft is operated under an Article 83bis arrangement (functions transferred between the State of Registry and the State of the Operator), it's worth confirming which authority's continuing-airworthiness requirements have applied and will apply, so the AD position is established against the right regime. These are worth flagging early; they're hard to fix at the last minute.
Handing over a defensible AD position
The goal at redelivery is not just "the ADs are done" but "here is the documented, per-tail AD position, reconciled and agreed, that you can carry forward." That's what closes a transfer without a technical dispute — and what protects the aircraft's value on the other side.
How Aviagent helps at redelivery
Aviagent re-establishes the applicable-AD set per tail from the directives' own effectivity, surfaces open and recurring items with their next-due points, and gives you an independent status to reconcile against the aircraft's records — with the evidence chain attached and every determination confirmed by engineers. For a lessor or redelivery team, that turns "prove the AD status" from a records scramble into a documented position you can hand over with confidence.
FAQ
What AD evidence do I need at redelivery? Per applicable AD: the corrective action taken, the work record, the date, and the sign-off — linked to the source directive. For recurring ADs, also the next due point and remaining margin against the lease's return conditions.
Do recurring ADs matter at redelivery? Yes. Recurring inspections keep coming due, and leases often require a minimum margin remaining at transfer. A recurring AD treated as "closed" is a common and costly redelivery problem.
What happens to AD applicability if the registry changes? The set of mandating authorities can change. Confirm which authority's directives apply after transfer and that nothing is dropped in the handover — especially cross-jurisdiction (comply-once) directives.
How does back-to-birth relate to ADs at redelivery? AD compliance evidence is part of the aircraft's record history. Where back-to-birth traceability is a return condition, gaps in that chain — including AD evidence — can hold up the transfer or impair value.
See which ADs apply to your fleet — free, in about 30 seconds. Try the free AD lookup, or book a 20-minute walkthrough.
Related reading: Back-to-birth records explained · Building an audit-ready AD evidence chain · Which airworthiness directives apply to your aircraft.
About the author — Satya Neerupudi is Founder & CEO/CTO of Aviagent and an aeronautical engineer with 25 years in continuing airworthiness at SAS, GE Aviation, Pratt & Whitney, and HAL.