Robbed at LSZB Bern-Belp
 

Just a word of warning...

I landed there, parked for two days, took fuel from the bowser, paid the landing fees, went out through Customs with my pax to the aircraft, loaded them in, was about ready to start when a minibus was parked right across our nose and a snotty little youth in a uniform jumped and said that we had to go to the Police in the main terminal, 200m away. Furthermore, even though we had just walked from there (indeed back and forth) we had to go in his minibus and pay £80 for the ride.

There was no arguing, especially with the vehicle parked where it was, so I had to pay up.

This is the kind of thing you get all the time in Africa, and you factor in some bunce to pay for it, but I was very surprised to get what was pure piracy in a supposedly civilised country like Switzerland.

They have a reputation for being crooks (look at the Jewish money they still hold from the war) but this was the first time I had actually been robbed in Switzerland.

Beware! Bern-Belp is best avoided!

Timothy, were you and your passengers wearing the yellow hi-viz jackets? And further - WHY did you have to go to the police?

Immigration. Or emigration I suppose, strictly.

Weird. Bern-Belp you and the passengers CAN walk unassisted to your plane IF AND ONLY IF everyone is wearing mandatory hi-viz jackets. If not, mandatory handling. Can't understand the reason for the repeat trip to Police though - did you initially exit through a Schengen door maybe?

You have my sympathy. I have to agree both with you and with Silvaire.

Similar thing happened to me on a land crossing--after an exchange of opinions I was deemed a "menace to the State" (:E) and denied entry. An outcome entirely to my satisfaction, I must say. :ok:

Ghadafi was right: those thieving bastards should be split between the neighbouring countries.

Took a nice little training today. Didn't really want to, but am now glad to have had to. Learned to proceed as follows:

-) Hallo, good afternoon (or whatever)
-) Nice to meet you, what was your name?
-) Can you substantiate that?
-) Thank you! Who is your manager?
-) Could I talk to her/him ?

"Social engineering" is the apparent buzzword.

(disclaimer: this posting might contribute to poster's career opportunities, and could be meant to)

Straight from the horse's mouth (AIP Switzerland):

In all fairness they DO give you an alternative - you could walk a 737 load of pax across the ramp if you wanted to (and had jackets for everyone).

So do I understand correctly that you were not robbed at the airport but just failed to follow published procedures, and now you're so angry at yourself that you claim to have been robbed?

I don't like the yellow viz jackets either, but if it saves money it could be a good thing....

Many Europeans like nothing better than to mindlessly follow "published procedures", no matter how pointless. Perhaps they feel satisfaction that they have properly followed the instructions of their masters, a bit like a trained dog might feel.

Oddly the last time I flew into/out of CH I did have the correct jackets by chance, but we were about the only people at the airport wearing them! Les Eplatures, genuinely one of the nicest airfields I've been to in the last few years, complete with ILS and visiting Customs at no extra charge.

To be fair to Switzerland, I have flown into Lausanne once and it was a superb airfield with great staff. Its a shame when other locations undermine the good service others are working hard to provide.

Where exactly did Timothy even hint at, never mind suggest, that he didn't follow published proceedures?

If you think Switzerland is bad, you should not even think about flying in Germany :E

And heaven help you if you end up at Rotterdam, I suppose; the only airport where some little security idiot has refused to let my passengers in because they didn't have boarding passes :D

The Swiss are anal, but not THAT anal - I doubt the immigration officer sent the van after them just because he was bored. Just because you CAN walk out directly on the apron in Bern doesn't mean it's a good idea to bypass customs if flying out of Schengen.

Now as to the bus - if you read the AIP and have the jackets with you, you can just tell the handler bus driver to bugger off and walk over to the terminal, and there's really nothing he can do.

Considering I managed to land there without a flight plan despite it being a mandatory flight plan airport - and did not get marched off to some somber gaol, I really doubt they bother coming to see you just to be entertained.

Now as to the government control paranoiacs that see Big Brother into the hi-viz obligation, I suggest a bit of Swiss history is in order. As you may recall (or not) with the introduction of the Schengen agreement and the designated "airport secure zones" (of which the ramp is part of) access to that area has been restricted to holders of airport IDs. Everyone else was supposed to get shuttled to the plane under supervision of airport ID holders. Considering that would have meant an 80 quid charge every time you'd go to your local friendly club for a bimble around the Alps, an agreement was struck whereby crew and passengers under crew's supervision are allowed to walk the apron (as long as no taxiway crossing is involved) freely as long as they wear the hi viz jackets (that all airport workers are wearing). Non-point of entry airports are not bothered about the hi vizs, that's why in places like Lausanne, Gruyères etc etc you won't see them.

So for those of you who see it as a government imposition on us - it was actually the other way around. Your UK (or European) mileage might vary, but that's how it happened here.

I hope you realise that in real international airports with line traffic like Geneva and Zurich a "customs box" wasn't exactly a feasible solution, so we poor stupid Swiss resident pilots had to settle for the next best free solution applicable to all airports....

Yes and no. If you keep in mind that a) 99.9 percent of flights originating in Geneva and Zurich are international and b)European general aviation is a fraction of its US counterpart, you either go for a hi-viz idiotic policy that is free and easy to use all over the country, or proudly shout your GA individual wants and needs to the airport operators, who will no doubt bend over backwards to accomodate i'm sure.... One of the two strategies is more likely to succeed...

Silvaire, I am sure that you're familiar with the expression "In winter it ain't like summer". You also know very well uropean major airports have never -ever- been GA geared, but rather line geared. Real estate in Europe is at a premium. Hence the European major airport setup will always be optimised towards servicing line operations - because line traffic is what brings the money in. That means handling, no fancy "custom boxes", and minimal GA space on the ramp, with leisure GA being at the bottom of the feeding chain. At most major airports the managers are looking to kick leisure GA out, because they make a lot more money with business GA and line.

Now you can rave and rant about how great GA facilities are in the US and we fully agree with you. I also heard that in Papua New Guinea everyone walks around the jungle strips quite freely. Relevance of that? Zero. The fact is, we cannot replicate that here as much as we'd like to - and if a yellow jacket is going to save me 80 bucks each way to the aircraft, then so be it. The alternative (which i'm not entirely sure you are aware of) is that leisure GA is killed off completely. The setup as it is now allows me to take off from an international airport going in through a dedicated entrance, no queues, minimal security hassle - all it takes is a yellow vest. Alternative? GA is killed off and we're all off to Sleazyjet.

Again -in spite of what you think, the purpose of the "secure apron zone" was never to build a business coercing people to pay handling fees. Those businesses existed already since the dawn of time and didn't need our measly contribution to do well - the secure apron only came about in 2007 - 2008ish with the whole Schengen and secure borders hulabaloo.

For some reason it appears that you cannot even envisage that things can be different depending on location, without necessarily an evil intent of the government behind it. Building a handling business to fleece GA of our money? Ha bloody ha. That would work only if the powers that be were actually aware of the existence of GA.

This thread is about being robbed.

I fully agree with the anti hi-viz lobby and i totally disagree with the Europe bashing although the EASA body seems fully intent on proving the Europe bashers right.

However if you want to discuss both these matters i suggest you start separate threads about them.

This thread was about someone claiming to having been robbed by the authorities where in fact it seems he wanted to take off without clearing Schengen and someone decided he needed to come back to customs....

Grow up....