Senior Consumer Policy Advisor

Salary: £45,000 up to £53,000 dependent upon experience

Contract Type: Permanent – Full Time

Security Level: BPSS

Visa Restrictions: This position does not offer visa sponsorship.

Please note that both a CV and a cover letter are required for any application detailing how you meet the person specification for the role.

We are the UK's aviation and aerospace regulator and recognised as a world leader in its field. Our activities are diverse, enabling the aviation industry to meet the highest safety standards, and we pride ourselves on our ability to adapt to the constantly evolving aviation environment.

About the team you’ll be part of

The Consumer Protection team is responsible for delivering against the CAA’s key strategic focus area to protect consumers and the public, ensuring that the aviation sector puts consumers at the heart of what they do. As a minimum, this means the sector meeting their legal obligations arising from consumer protection law, including passenger rights during flight delays and cancellations, and those related to access to air travel for disabled people. Looking forwards, this will also mean looking at how our powers and regulation might evolve.

We are a passionate team with a clear purpose to deliver a fair experience for consumers in aviation, ensuring that passengers have the experience they expect when they travel, and that disability is not a barrier to travel. This is a high-profile team within the CAA, and we have plans to grow to ensure we meet both consumer and government expectations.

We are recruiting for a Senior Consumer Policy Advisor role. This is your chance to join a team at the forefront of ensuring the aviation industry delivers choice, value and fair treatment for aviation consumers. We are a looking for individuals with a regulatory (or similar) policy background and a strong belief in doing the right thing for consumers to join our expanding team.

The Role

Reporting into a Consumer Policy Principal, you will be expected to support the development and delivery of policy projects that ensure that consumers are treated fairly. This will involve working collaboratively with others across the Consumer Protection team, other teams across the CAA and a range of external stakeholders. The role combines the need for strong analytical skills, excellent written communication skills and a broad understanding of consumer issues and market dynamics.

Colleagues in our team work closely with other teams across the CAA, other regulators, Government, and a range of external stakeholders to seek out, identify and address problems that affect passengers when they use aviation.

The need for resilience across the Consumer Protection team means that the role holder will gain technical knowledge and experience in the regulation of the rights of consumers across the range of laws that offer protection to aviation consumers.

Your key responsibilities

We are looking for experienced policy professionals with a track record of delivering policy projects, producing clear accessible documents and effectively managing stakeholder relationships. Key responsibilities include:

• Responsible for the delivery of policy projects in areas that impact consumers across aviation.
• Undertaking robust data analysis to form insights, with a focus on areas we can make a difference for consumers and the ability to present this in a concise and easily understandable way.
• Producing clear accessible documents, with coherent narrative flows.
• Influencing thinking across both the Consumer Protection team and wider CAA by building strong relationships and bringing a balanced perspective, including awareness of commercial dynamics.
• Building strong professional relationships with external stakeholders, including industry, Government and consumer bodies.
• Act as a role model, actively demonstrating the CAA’s values of: Do The Right Thing; Never Stop Learning; Build Collaborative Relationships; and Respect Everyone.

The skills, knowledge and experience you will need for success:

• Enthusiastic about consumer issues and the impact that the CAA can have in improving the consumer experience in aviation.
• Experience of working on consumer policy issues.
• Strong editorial skills to ensure that all documents are drafted in a clear and accessible way.
• Ability to identify and analyse issues that affect consumers and identify practical ways of resolving them, considering the practical realities of commercial airports, airlines and other service providers.
• Ability to work independently, managing and drawing upon the work of others, and to work effectively with external stakeholders.
• Strong experience of compiling and analysing data and an ability to present this in a way which clearly explains the key messages, evidence-based conclusions and/or recommendations.
• Excellent communication skills, with an ability to bring together arguments and analysis clearly and robustly and convey these in a way that engages stakeholders and senior CAA colleagues.
• Ability to quickly build and maintain effective working relationships with a wide range of stakeholders.
• Good IT skills, in particular MS Word and Excel.

Desirable skills

• Experience of using external market research organisations to undertake research on consumer priorities and preferences.
• Experience of assessing organisational compliance with key regulatory requirements.
• Project management experience, including setting objectives, planning, tracking progress, and managing risks.

Additional Information

For many appointments within the CAA, these roles require access to operationally sensitive infrastructure and/or Nationally Protected information. For these roles the post holders must undergo National Security Vetting and achieve the appropriate level of clearance.

To be vetted you must have the right to work in the UK so that meaningful checks can be undertaken.

If you do not meet these requirements, we may not be able to accept your application.

For more information on BPSS clearance please visit - BPSS clearance

The CAA values high ethical standards and personal integrity among employees. If invited for interview you will be asked to complete a declaration of interest.

Relocation & Property

The CAA will be relocating from Aviation House (Our Gatwick Office) to new premises in a few years’ time. Our move is driven by strategic, operational and environmental considerations.

We will be moving to a new local home, up to a 15-mile radius of Aviation House, to minimise disruption for our valued colleagues and customers.

We are now working with colleagues and visitors to understand what we need in our new office, before we start our property search. We will sell Aviation House and land, vacate the site and move to new premises, but we do not expect to move before 2028

Inclusive Recruitment

We are passionate about diversity and ensuring all are included at the CAA. We are an equal opportunity employer and actively encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds.

As a member of the Disability Confident scheme, applicants who meet the minimum criteria for a role with us will be guaranteed an interview. We use fair and inclusive selection approaches to hire the best person for the job based on merit alone. If you require an adjustment for any reason, please let us know.

Working With Us

We are on a journey towards being increasingly adaptable, where our colleagues collaborate as part of cross-functional teams. This approach ensures we never stop learning together. It also means that you may become involved in activities that take you out of your day-to-day role, providing you with opportunities to develop and grow your career with us.

We have embraced hybrid working and offer flexible working patterns, being open to having a conversation about what works for you. We know where and when we work is important in achieving a work-life balance.

We offer a range of excellent benefits such as flexible working arrangements, free onsite gym at Gatwick, discounted gym membership for London, 28 days annual leave, additional 5 days leave purchase scheme, a generous pension scheme and much more!

Our Values

Do The Right Thing, Never Stop Learning, Build Collaborative Relationships, Respect Everyone – For more information please Click Here

Closing Date: Thursday 9th October 2025 (11:59pm).

Interview Date: w/c 20th and 27th October 2025

We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.

No recruitment agencies please.