Interesting. I hadn't realized things were like that in Europe So I'm a little curious. Over here dispatch makes up the flight plan and we pull it up on a computer. There's a fuel figure and we accept or decline, generally the former for me.
So how does it work there? Do you flight plan for each leg and then order the fuel you want? If so you must be very busy! And where does the "pressure" manifest itself? I am presented with a fuel figure and then I'm supposed to submit a written explanation of why I want more. If you are ordering your own fuel then you are not, per se, declining dispatch's reccommendation.
In a broader sense, I am concerned about the direction things are going. State mandated minimums here are 30 mins FOD. But this is an old number and I don't think the regulator ever dreamed that operators would actually be coming so close to it. I can easily see a move by operators to have that figure trimmed in the future. A "rational risk assessment" can justify whatever it's users desire it to.