WHAT IS MEANT BY THIS enroute alternate required at the planning stage????
The only times I used 3% contingency was only because we were
performance limited. Slightly above MTOW, reducing from 5% to 3% (couple of hundred kgs) for long flights (B738). I guess it was indeed a planning stage requirement, otherwise we wouldn't be able to dispatch.
I'm not sure if thats the answer we were looking for but I hope it helped.
Qwerti