Originally Posted by
Private jet
That's true enough, to a point....
How often is "occasionally"? and are you saying I don't understand "how and why" the plan was generated? If it's "not hard to beat" then please tell us why and how, and why airlines invest a lot of money & a lot of clever people work hard to generate these apparent works of fiction. YET AGAIN Cost Index is about minimum overall cost per hour, not just reducing fuel burn. I think 99% of professional pilots would agree the plans work very well on 99+ % of occasions. No deep thinking is needed flight planning wise from the pilot until something totally unexpected occurs which obviously cannot be planned for in routine ops. We used ARINC plans which worked out very well.
Most of the times when we are filed at a high cost index it's because flight time is close to block time, and the company wants to show good on time arrival. At least half the time we are able to push a few minutes early, have a short taxi, get airborne, and I can reduce to CI15 and still be early. Reverse is true too. CI is a great tool, but if it not updated dynamically the pilot will definitely ba able to beat it often.