To follow on from my post the other day, it has now been confirmed by the BEC (even by one of the members that helped construct the model), that the model for grading the units is fundamentally flawed (mainecoon - did you get your proof)??
The overwhelming factor that affects each unit's score is the amount of traffic that it shifts per year.
That's as it should be I hear you cry! Those that shift more should get more!
Well... er...up to a point.
The factors that are used to level the playing field have, at best, a marginal affect.
It is difficult to explain, without having a copy of the model and the figures to illustrate, but our watch mathematician (who does actually have a degree in the subject, well, so he says), assures me that if you were to compare two units;
unit A shifting 1,000,000 aircraft per year
and unit B moving 100,000 per year
and given that the ratio of staff to movements is the same, i.e.
unit A with 1,000,000 movements has 100 controllers,
unit B with 100,000 movements having 10 controllers,
(therefore each indvidual controller working 10,000 flights per year),
then given that the mix of traffic and complexity are the same for both units
the total score for each unit shows the same ratio as the original movement figures i.e. 10:1!
Or, to put it another way - unit A's score would be 10 times greater than unit B's, and this despite the controllers at unit B working the same number of aircraft per controller as unit A, with exactly the same complexity and mix of traffic
So, what have we proved?
Unit A shifts 10 times the number of aircraft than unit B.
Thats all.