Just spent a few days (collectively) dredging through the Environment Agency (creating a better place)
website doing our submission. Still a month from the deadline and the tosspots have been on the blower reminding me that I'm approaching the deadline. No guarantee that they'll approve your plan (no pass/ fail criteria listed), restrictions in many submission fields of no more than 250 characters (including spaces); a load of drivel, dreamt up by someone who clearly has very little insight into the vagaries of aviation but is way up there on the bureaupole. Sweeping this aside, having lovingly constructed a data flow chart of how I'm going to collate this crud, I am thrilled when I realize that I'm finished with the forms. Eagerly punching the puce green Submit button, I'm assailed by the next page demanding £ 750 for my misery. And, no, you cannot pay with your Amex card. Somehow they've forgotten to stick VAT on.
What an enormous crock of swill.
The owner has already voiced his opinion of the whole scheme as a giant rip-off - now I've got to tell him to chip in 750 quid for the pleasure.
Rant over. But it's a sad day for aviation.