CLC - Centralised Load Control

[tristar500]

Is it me, or is CLC just another waste of time...

Its now becomming more and more common but from my own experience, it isnt all its cracked up to be.

No 'real-time' dispatcher at your aircraft and having to wait until the 'final' loadsheet is prepared from someone who might not even be in the same country, can take a lifetime. Sure ACARS is great, but its still not the same, having a trained person there in front of you to do the neccessary, and make instant changes if and when required. If youre not ACARS equiped, its not uncommon to be parked, having to wait for the 'final figures' to come in over the R/T :ugh:

[TopBunk]

If youre not ACARS equiped, its not uncommon to be parked, having to wait for the 'final figures' to come in

Having ACARS does not solve the problem:ugh:

You have to wait until the final figures are run, ACARS only provides an alternative delivery mechanism to VHF radio.

[nclops]

From a dispatchers point of view i couldn,t agree more, absolute waste of time having to wait for someone else to do what i could do myself so much quicker! It takes longer to send the figures to clc than it does to do the loadsheet.

[AltFlaps]

I agree, centralised load sheet systems are a complete waste of time.
The issue is that it allows the handling companies to stop employing 'real dispatchers' and start to take on lower paid 'gate agents'.

This is not a good step in our industry !!
I recently had a small head-to-head with a gate agent in AMS (one of the worst in Europe), and it transpired that she did not now what Zulu Time/GMT even meant ... :ugh:

The company I work for is currently implementing Electronic Flight Bag.
All we need form dispatch is how many pax and how many bags in each hold.

We (the crew) can then generate the load sheet in 0 seconds flat. It is transmitted wirelessly back to base, so we can close doors and foxtrot oscar immediately without even handing off paperwork !! I CAN'T WAIT :ok:

[STN Ramp Rat]

Well it depends... there is no weight and balance licence required in Europe, I don’t know about the rest of the world. It is possible that an agent starts on a Monday with no aviation experience and is producing a load sheet on Friday still with no aviation experience.

The theory is that the CLC Agents have experience and training that guarantees a safe loading. It also means that you only need to audit one facility and not every station.

I can certainly attest to a ramp agent being allocated to a DC8 freighter load sheet having never worked a cargo aircraft before and only having used Kilos. The crew looked at the figures and decided to operate MAN-MIA direct instead of via Gander because the payload was low ….. several hours later they landed in Gander “on fumes” this incident was due to a management instigated overtime ban in place at the time to save costs. The management said that this dispatch had been trained for load control so could do any aircraft.

On the flip side CLC officers will eventually have no “real world” experience which will leave them with no concept on volumes or how to load best for down line protection etc

As they say … you pays your money you makes your choice

[744rules]

Well it depends... there is no weight and balance licence required in Europe, I don’t know about the rest of the world. It is possible that an agent starts on a Monday with no aviation experience and is producing a load sheet on Friday still with no aviation experience.

I know for sure BA requires licenced people to produce loadsheets, be it locally or CLC. You get the basic training (both manual and DCS) and a resfresher course every three years. If you fail the tests, no loadsheet licence. You need a score of at least 90pct. In the days BA caried RRY, a mistake with this costs you 10 pts, so even a missing comma will cost you your license.


I have been in CLC several years, and I can assure you that for some stations it's a good decision to have CLC make up the loading instruction/loadsheet.

Naturally it helps when TRC (turn round co-ordinator) has (good) knowledge about weight and balance, in case of problems such as overload, out of trim, ....

[STN Ramp Rat]

I know for sure BA requires licenced people to produce loadsheets, be it locally or CLC.

My point exactly, as there is no European Licence airlines have had to develop their own. it is easier to train and audit a few prople in a central function and not a few people in every location.

[getjetsetgo]

in certain circumstances CLC isn't all that bad. wat i find is a prob with it though is that u have one controller doin multiples with varying taxi times. that causes problems. i work in the caribbean (ANU) and my company handles both BA and BD. the taxi time to the runway is 5 minutes if no traffic landing. BD loadsheets are done from MAN. all there dispatchers have to do while they sitting in the office is the two return long haul flights on a given day. say ANU and ORD on a friday or LAS and ORD on a tuesday. so i have only had the prob once of the captain calling in once about him sitting at the end of the runway and no final figures. with BA it happens every other week. and wen u call JFK (they do BA clc for all flights in the Western Hemisphere) they will tell you that they doin a mariad of other flights at the same time so just sit tight. while the captain at the end of the runway screaming for his figures, cuz the tower screaming at him cuz they got traffic inbound that now have to circle. in that sense it does tend to ruffle alot of feathers.

[Thunderbug]

CLC - Its good when it works. but....
when it doesn't it can really start to screw things up.

I've had taxi down and off a runway as I was bloking the entire airfield waiting for that wretched piece of paper to pop out the printer. Just last week it was a 30 minute wait for the final loadsheet. Shame it was the airport with the quickest taxiout on the network!

The frustration is made worse by a real lack of information - I can talk to the local staff on VHF, but they have to call the CLC by phone. The answer is always "It will be there in a minute" - but never is! They are starting to put the CLC phone number & contact on the provisional loadsheet.

We used to have real problems at our home base, so much so that ATC would not let us go anywhere that would let us block a runway entrance. Much better now.

I think it is good having all the experts in one place, but I do miss the personal liasons with a dispatcher when operating near aircraft weight limits.

[getjetsetgo]

yea i realised that bout a month ago that JFK clc was putting its contact number on the Provsional loadsheets. do they want the captains to give them a call. station ops staff can already see the contact details of who is completing the loadsheet. and if the aircraft has a prob then they call on radio and we give new york a call.

[Thunderbug]

getjetsetgo

do they want the captains to give them a call?

Calling the CLC is not a published procedure - but it is interesting that you hear a different answer when you call direct.

Via VHF - "They say it will be there in a minute"

Via phone - "We've got a problem, it will be a least 10 minutes"


T'Bug :ok: