david viewing
VFR flight plans are recieved at Swanwick (and Prestwick) but at Swanwick we work only on the flight details provided on frequency by each a/c. In the event of an incident we can retrieve the relevant flight plan and extract the required details.
A call to one of our three frequencies will quickly get a flight plan activated if your airfield ATC was still in bed.
To correct one point in your post, all FISOs at Swanwick and Scottish are assistants. The controllers were released a number of years ago to man the revenue earning sectors.
Happy flying