Are Ryanair pilots falsely logging flight duty times at STN?

[Single Flasher]

I would like to know how Ryanair continues to get away with the incorrect, and illegal practice of falsly logging sign-on times for its pilots in Stansted.

The required sign-on time is 45 mins before ETD. But virtually all the F/O´s and many Captains turn up at least an hour before through necessity. Reason being as we all know, that one must contend with broken Computers, broken printers, printers without paper, missing plates, missing flight plans walking to the bravo apron....etc. I´m sure others of you can elaborate. However the 'early pilots' cannot reflect this arrival time on the Voyage Report and falsly report that they arrived 45 minutes before ETD. The cummulitive gains for Ryanair over the year are obvious and deliberate.

Ryanair know that the pilots are coming in early to avoid the obvious ramifications of a late departure due to flight crew. Why do the IAA, and CAA for that matter, allow this practice to happen?

SF

[beamer]

Turn up 45 minutes before departure !

[captjns]

Flight Duty Time does not start at the time you pitch up for work. You may grab a coffee... talk with collegues... what ever.

Your statement is entirely false. Crewmembers can put what ever time they want to put on the voyage report.

Just pitch up 45 minutes before flight. If the printers don't work... you can't get your flight plans... what ever the problem may be... note it on the voyage report.

If you have issues with alterations of time on a document take the matter up with your chief pilot.

[Strepsils]

SF never mentioned flight duty time, he mentioned duty time, there is a difference. In my company Duty time starts at report (or if called from standby, when your standby began) and flight duty time is one hour prior to departure. (In most cases duty and flight duty start at the same time, but not always.) Flight duty time ends at on chox of last flight and Duty time at end of post flight duties. (c.20 mins).

If you report one hour before departure because it's the only way you'll get out on time, log it as your report time and explain why. If you can't do that, turn up 45mins before and accept the lateness. Until you (and your colleagues) do this, nothing will change.

[ukatco_535]

Captjns/Strepsils

Very well made points - I appreciate that the company may not be great to work for and that the pilots etc have limited rights within that company, but if they work to the correct times and the companies equipment or lack of causes delays then the company will suffer and come to learn.

If pilots decide they will turn to earlier because of anticipated problems, then that is their decision and in my humble opinion, they have not got any reason to grumble.

I have a limited amount of briefing I have to do before I go on duty, nowhere near as in depth as you guys have with planning etc. We do not have enough computers to brief every ATCO at once, so some of us come in earlier to do it - that is the choice we make, to complain to the company because we decide to turn to early is a non starter.

[CarltonBrowne the FO]

Interesting post, strepsils. However, as I understand it, under UK law all duty before a flight is Flight Duty time- even standby duty if one is called out. Depending on the length of the standby period, it may be permissible to add the length of the stand by to the permissible max flight duty time, but the whole duty counts as Flight Duty.
If one actually reports for work (even if for office duty), then flies later in the day, the entire duty counts as Flight Duty time, with all applicable limitations counting from the original report time. However, if an individual opts to report before rostered report time, that does not change the actual report time. It is up to the individual to decide how early to report for work. I tend to worry about how much rest an individual has had, if they are in the crewroom more than 15 minutes before report time for an early.

[Dale Hardale]

A well known Dubai airline picks up pilots 2 hrs 15 mins before departure, mostly arriving at the sign on area at least 1 hr 45 mins before ETD. Yet the duty commences 1 hr before ETD. I've yet to see anyone try and claim the extra time.

This is reality I'm afraid and if pilots turned up at the magical "1 hr" before departure, nothing would leave on time.

There is no union for support and therefore no real way to stop this practice or get paid for the extra 45 minutes. Plus, I think one reason people put up with it is the free transport which is a godsend especially on the way home after an all night flight.

So, maybe you don't have it so bad after all.

[Strepsils]

CarltonBrowne - You're right, and reading further into I just confused myself even more!:}

Our duty hours totals (the 55hr/week 2000/year etc.) include duty and flight duty, so for this purpose they all count. However, we do keep track of the difference between the duty and flight duty. For instance, if we report at base to be driven to another airport for our flight, our Flight duty still starts one hour before dep although our max duty period for the day is based on report time at base.

For the life of me I can't think of the reason for their being a difference. I'm sure I knew the reason at one point but it completely escapes me just now:\ :O

[BOAC]

Now I'm getting confused!if we report at base to be driven to another airport for our flight, our Flight duty still starts one hour before dep although our max duty period for the day is based on report time at base.

FDP commences AT report time wherever. In that case at base. The pos does not count as a sector but it 'uses up' the FDP.




"When a crew member is required to report for duty inadvance of the stipulated report time for a scheduled
flight, to carry out a task at the behest of the company,
then the time spent on that task shall be part of the
subsequent FDP."

"All time spent on positioning at the behest of the company
shall count as duty, but positioning does not count as a
sector when calculating the FDP. In these circumstances
the FDP commences not later than the time at which the
crew member reports for the positioning journey, or
positions."

That is JAROPS - or did I misread your post?

[Mr Angry from Purley]

Strepsils
If you worked for an Italian Airline probably yes, but if your driven to another base your FDP and maximum allowable FDP starts at the report time at your designated base. I'm not sure if EI Regs allow your FDP to start at the base your driven to?.
In the UK there is now a subtle difference to "driven". If your in a taxi then that's fine but if you drive a hire car there at the Companies behest then your penalised by a sector. :\

[Phileas Fogg]

If there is a Ryanair Flight Crew Notice to the effect that whilst official report time is STD - 45 minutes you SHALL report at STD - 1 hour but not commence duty for a further 15 minutes then the title of this thread is quite appropriate, namely 'Ryanair false logging of duty times'.

However, if you're the sensible guy that appreciates that the sooner you get there then the sooner you get home again then the title of this thread is quite inappropriate.

However, one could be one of those that wants to do his best to mess everybody around, stand outside the crew room until exactly STD -45 minutes, then for the next 4 sectors miss all the ATC & airport slots, delay up to 700 passengers in the process, they that pay your mortgage etc, and then arrive home 3 hours later than you should have done, all for the sake of 15 minutes, well enough said!

[RAT 5]

A friend has been griping about this matter for a while. He tells me that the pre-flight work load has increased, but the sign-on time of 45 minutes is the same. There is also a requirement to be onboard 25mins before ETD. That leaves 20mins to prepare 4 sectors. In the present winter climate, that seems very rushed, but don't forget safety comes first, however lateness means the boot.
He also notes that 0545 is the +45 min sign on time before earlies, (STD 06.30) and that 0545 is the limit for 2 consecutive earlies. Could it be that by signing on 1.00hr before STD would mean 5 earlies could not be flown, but by using 45 mins they can?????????

He comments that crewing, when calling out for a change of flight, quote the reprt time of +1.00hr. Curious. When asking why, he says that 45 mins will create a late departure. Even more curious.

Does the expression, "bending the rules" come to mind?

[Pigsfly]

So this issue has reared its ugly head again. Hmmm, 45 Mins to find your paperwork, self brief, equip with any information missing from the brief, make you way to the aircraft.................Tight in STN, but in DUB impossible, due to the fact that crews must do all this and then transport themselves to the aircraft passing through security. And Woe betide any crew who are late off blocks.

Mr IAA, kindly pull your head out of the sand, it is not possible for crew to complete self brief, get to the Aircraft, pre flight aircraft and board same properly in 45 mins...............SAFE?????????

Pressure...pressure...pressure, guess where the error chain is!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oink

[Ropey Pilot]

Phileas Fogg: However, one could be one of those that wants to do his best to mess everybody around, stand outside the crew room until exactly STD -45 minutes, then for the next 4 sectors miss all the ATC & airport slots, delay up to 700 passengers in the process, they that pay your mortgage etc, and then arrive home 3 hours later than you should have done, all for the sake of 15 minutes, well enough said! It isn't for the sake of 15 mins though is it? It is for the sake of 15mins every working day of your life - that adds up.

Also add the fact that there are limits on consecutive earlies for safety reasons and these can be 'broken' by falsely applying a 45 min report when in fact it is 1hr.

So when an a/c piles in due to the crew being over fatigued I'm sure that those 700 pax who pay your mortgage (well their families anyway) will be fine with it because they weren't occasionally 15 mins late for a period of a few weeks till the airline got the message and rescheduled the flights.:rolleyes:

[Strepsils]

Mr Angry and BOAC - We all work to the same rules, just my explanation and too many variations on duty time causing confusion. When I said before dep although our max duty period for the day is based on report time at base I meant that the time from when we report at base to be driven is the start point for max allowable duty, as you'd expect. However, we log duty time and flight duty time seperately. :confused:

[Pigsfly]

This was a clever ply by FR Management many moons ago. Bear a thought for the Line trainers and trainees who are still just allowed 45 mins for pre-flight briefing. So you pay FR a kings ransom to type train you and then turn up for line trng to get a minimal brief and negative time in the cockpit on the ground before pushback.

And the Cabin Crews safety/security checks, an Aircraft parked all night, unattended, is five min check before boarding sufficient?

What a can of Worms........Crew who highlighted this in the past were threatened with dismissal if they delayed a flight on account of 45 min report.

[gandolf]

The biggest problem is the 45 minutes you have to allow from the car park to get to the office at some airports!

[Arkroyal]

For CAP 371 airlines, the 45 minute report time is a fiddle designed to get the aircraft away as early as possible but having the crew report at or after 0600 local, before which the FDP would be restricted to 9 hours on a four sector day. From 0600, 10hr.45min are allowable.

All knds of pressure may be applied to get you to report early to get the show on the road (usually short of anything in writing, which the CAA might find interesting, so not much chance, Phileas)... you know the sort of thing, appealing to one's 'professionalism', 'conscientiousness', 'can do attitude' etc.

It's all cr@p. Conscientious, professional pilots stick to the FTL rules, which were designed to aid our rest and fatigue management. Anything else is unsafe and ilegal.
I aim to arrive in the crew room at STD-45min. If I'm a few minutes early, I get on with the job.
If the weather's cr@p, the computer u/s, the printer out of paper, the queue at security long, the aircraft parked a mile's hike away, I care not.

Strepsils

Standby notwithstanding, your duty time and your FDP start at report at home base in the case you are illustrating. The FDP finishes on blocks at last sector's end. Duty time finishes usually 30 min later, depending on your company's agreement with CAA.

[Pigsfly]

Ahhh you see its none of the CAA`s biz in this case. As Ryanair is operating on the Irish register at present, with plans to go to a former Eastern Block (Latvian) Register.

Ain`t no one in the IAA or Irish Govt. to crack the whip at M.O.L and take him to task on any of his antics. Why? Heck I dunno.

[Arkroyal]

Indeed, pigs

And isn't it a pity that an airline whose biggest base is in the UK isn't answerable to the CAA.

Shame on them that they don't take a closer interest.

[GEENY]

JAR OPS 1 Subpart Q is still left to the National Authorities to play with, hence the "Catch as U can" Circus. In Italy it took a legal action to force the CAA to enforce their own rules on airlines and it is still not working. European Disunion and that....
From today's atwonline:
"European Council last week formally closed the first reading on the new EU-OPS Regulation, which seeks to integrate technical requirements and administrative procedures in the field of civil aviation. EU-OPS includes harmonizing flight time limitations across Europe, setting a minimum FTL level directly applicable to all EU countries. The European Cockpit Assn., representing 34,000 pilots, is calling for safety improvements and swift revision of the text while recognizing EU-OPS as "a first step towards a safety-based level playing field in Europe." ECA argues that safety risks caused by pilot fatigue are not addressed sufficiently in the Council's Common Position. The second reading will start later this month when the European Parliament examines the proposed legislation. The EP has a maximum of 3-4 months to conclude the second reading."


by Cathy Buyck

[overlord]

Whatever....

New FAA Flight Time and Duty Time rules expected to be published some time this summer.

According to my source at FAA the FAR revision will include a "flow chart" so as to eliminate any confusion. Also, the FAA will begin hardcore enforcement of flight/duty time limitations. Finally, thank God.

Hopefully this will eliminate the dreaded "delay due to unforseen circumstances", "freight delay", "passenger delay", "wx delay", "mx delay" clause so often pushed upon us by management.

OL

[superpilut]

unforseen circumstances:}
Gotta love that one.

[sky9]

Do the IAA do check rides, in which case have they not noticed that preparing for 4 sectors in 10 minutes ( 25 mins at the aircraft + 10 minutes for security and walking to the aircraft) is clearly unreasonable?
Or do they operate on the "3 monkeys" philosophy?