I visited them recently with my AOPA UK hat on to find out what's going on.
Because you are being given direct access into the AFTN and your own personal AFTN account they have to vet applicants for legitimacy before you get access. This includes checking that the license details you submitted tally with your personal details.
This is where the Data Protection jobsworths come in. NATS is a public/private partnership owned in part by the Airline Group. It is a commercial organisation carrying out some State functions on behalf of CAA, which is an Agency of the DfT. CAA are the holders of the licensing data and unlike the US it is not published to the public at large. CAA were trying to charge NATS 15 quid for every verification enquiry so now someone from NATS drives from Swanwick to the Belgrano with a list to do the verification process. It gets done when it is possible to spare someone from Ops and of course in the summer staff availability goes down (ATCO's are entitled to holidays too
) Hence the delays.
Demand has been higher than expected, which is perhaps is understandable.
God:- "Moses! I have a commandment for you!"
Moses:- "What's it going to cost me?"
God:- "They're free"
Moses:- "In that case I'll take ten."
Improvements to the login process are anticipated in October. It's run by a small team based at Swanwick who are committed and keen for it to succeed.
Re "pay per flight". As stated above NATS is a commercial organisation. It is in large part funded by the airlines, who are a major shareholder and we all know the airlines are going through a very rough patch at the moment so they are cutting costs wherever they can. It also suffers from a fixed cost base and variable income. It takes a long time to train ATCOs and you can't just lay them off when demand drops and expect them to come running back to be re-hired when things pick up.
I've been asked several times what services NATS could provide over and above the basic ICAO mandated ones that pilots would be willing to pay for. My answer has been that they will struggle to come up with something worth doing. If smaller and more nimble organisations are not able to make money out of PPL's then NATS is going to find it impossible.
NATS has in the past sought to extend charging for services that it purports to be purely GA related, such as ATSOCAS. CAA has refused, which is to their credit. When NATS got their license it was on the basis that they would provide all of the services then being provided. Since that time they have been able to make significant savings by using technology to reduce headcount. Introducing technology to allow the same services to be provided at lower cost does not amount to introducing new services.
WRT Homebriefing, Austrocontrol uses the same software that used to be used by NATS AIS before the current website. NATS did not however implement the FPL filing part of it.
Mike
AOPA UK