Game Show Question

[bbmikej]

Supervisors/Duty Mangers/Anyone other then me and God, talking to my crew via ACARS/SatCom/HF or If it’s smoke signals... move over I’m fanning those flames Jim.

If it’s not me, I’m in rage mode.

To play off of that, when Supervisors/Duty Managers/Coordinators call a station and introduce themselves as dispatch. I know it is a little thing, but I hate calling a station to ask about something and the respond with "Dispatch said to do ..." "I am the dispatcher on this flight and I didn't tell anyone over there anything. Are you sure it was dispatch?" "They said they were xxxxxx dispatch."

 

[DogwoodLynx]

To play off of that, when Supervisors/Duty Managers/Coordinators call a station and introduce themselves as dispatch. I know it is a little thing, but I hate calling a station to ask about something and the respond with "Dispatch said to do ..." "I am the dispatcher on this flight and I didn't tell anyone over there anything. Are you sure it was dispatch?" "They said they were xxxxxx dispatch."

Yeah that’s crap too. If you are a lead or manager don’t try to pretend your not - own it or don’t do it at all.

 

[757Geek]

I don’t get all the hating on captain’s adding fuel. Yeah it’s inconvenient for them to call and act like their the only pilot in the sky, but the regs state that they share joint responsibility in preflight planning. If they want the fuel and an alternate, so long as it doesn’t jeopardize safety, then they get it.

 

[manniax]

I don’t get all the hating on captain’s adding fuel. Yeah it’s inconvenient for them to call and act like their the only pilot in the sky, but the regs state that they share joint responsibility in preflight planning. If they want the fuel and an alternate, so long as it doesn’t jeopardize safety, then they get it.

My problem is not the fuel add itself (although I will point out if it's bumping payload or there's some other major issue) but I do like to be contacted directly for it. I think sometimes the adds can be a bit excessive, depending on the crew, but the fuel add itself is not a problem for me. Trying to add it without calling or sending an ACARS (and acting annoyed when I insist on a confirmation of the amount) is another story. As previously mentioned, adding it via iPad is just fine with me as well, since I automatically get notified that way.

 

[gopherdx]

I don't mind the crews adding a bit of fuel at all. Rounding up to the nearest thousand or adding a few hundred pounds is totally fine by me and you don't even have to tell me. What I do have an issue with is 1. like manniax stated, if you're going to add 2-3k.. tell me - especially if I already planned you close to MTOW/MLDW.. 2. A big part of our jobs is to save the company money, which in turn can equal more profit sharing for employees and higher operating margins. When a pilot adds 3000 lbs on a VFR day with no volume and no weather.. I find that to be a waste.

 

[CF34-3B1]

I don’t get all the hating on captain’s adding fuel. Yeah it’s inconvenient for them to call and act like their the only pilot in the sky, but the regs state that they share joint responsibility in preflight planning. If they want the fuel and an alternate, so long as it doesn’t jeopardize safety, then they get it.

Sure, it is a joint responsibility. But all jokes aside, a majority of the time all the extra fuel is not necessary. It is almost always just captain feel good gas. And when we are pissing away money left and right because some guys have “personal minimums” it is just wasteful. I definitely put safety and legality first, but let’s not forget the reason we all go to work everyday...We all expect a paycheck. So yeah it is frustrating when you actually look at all the available information pertaining to the flight before you send it and the captain just arbitrarily adds fuel. I can’t speak for everyone, but for me it’s not a power struggle thing at all. It’s just frustrating to know that it’s a waste. It is a little ironic that the ones that talk endlessly throughout the flight about pay suddenly don’t care about profits when it comes time to fuel. On bad weather days, yeah let’s fuel this thing up. But when we can save money let’s work together and not be wasteful.

 

[T/O w/FSII]

What does tankering 3k extra actually cost? Seems pretty insignificant on airliner?

 

[CF34-3B1]

Does it matter? If not needed it’s waste. Say it’s only 1$ extra. Multiply that by 4000 flights every day of the year. Equals $1,460,000 dollars wasted just cause. Yeah not every captain on every flight does it but it can be significant over time. Of course sometimes it’s beneficial to tanker but if it saved money to tanker on a particular flight then most of the time there would already be tanker planned for the flight.

 

[derg]

I know our chief pilots would probably be more like “Did the fueler not show up? How can I help you?”

 

[LastMinuteAirline]

What does tankering 3k extra actually cost? Seems pretty insignificant on airliner?

A literal example from a 3 1/2 hr flight I am working today, a fully loaded A321 adding 3k fuel will burn an additional 46.5 gallons. At 2.23 per gallon (at this particular station) thats $103, roughly.

 

[who'swho]

Supervisors/Duty Mangers/Anyone other then me and God, talking to my crew via ACARS/SatCom/HF or If it’s smoke signals... move over I’m fanning those flames Jim.

If it’s not me, I’m in rage mode.

When I worked in the regional world we had another regional who called ops and told them to gate return one of our flights so they could put one of their deadheads on. All without consulting us. You talk about rage...

 

[CF34-3B1]

When I worked in the regional world we had another regional who called ops and told them to gate return one of our flights so they could put one of their deadheads on. All without consulting us. You talk about rage...

Oh yeah! I ‘Member

 

[A1TAPE]

When I worked in the regional world we had another regional who called ops and told them to gate return one of our flights so they could put one of their deadheads on. All without consulting us. You talk about rage...

What would cause an airline to do this? If they were that needing of the crew member they could have guaranteed them a positive space seat by getting them a ticket space permitting or put them on the next flight, however if it was a more time sensitive issue then they could have called in another crew to man the flight that the deadheading crew member was supposed to be flying.

 

[DogwoodLynx]

When I worked in the regional world we had another regional who called ops and told them to gate return one of our flights so they could put one of their deadheads on. All without consulting us. You talk about rage...

Lol yep.


My current employer lets us take out up to 500 lbs of ferry fuel to get more people on (with no expectation of calling dispatch).

For me, having been a dispatcher previous to this, I tend to call anyway. Yes, I can read the remarks but I don’t have the full picture and I’m not the one that planned it.

Edit:

Is 500 lbs a lot? No, but it goes back to having everyone on the same page.

 

[thewaffles]

LOL... Captain asks for additional fuel and the dispatcher pulls the strip and calls the Cheif Pilot??? That's a weird company

Don't get me wrong, if a crew wants more fuel for a valid reason, I'm on board, but there was more to the story and I didn't feel like typing it all out. This particular (former Netjets) Captain who suffers from Napoleon syndrome has been a repeat offender in our group, so he needed a friendly reminder as to what operational control is and how it works. Coincidently, he tried pulling the same thing with another dispatcher last week.

Fuel is always a tricky subject, but to me being safe and fuel efficient is job security. The problem here at our company is that there really hasn't been fuel guidance or enforcement, it's been basically the Wild West (especially after FPM came out). Prior to the new fuel initiative that came out last year, our average planned EFOBs were significantly higher than our peers. And exactly how @CF34-3B1 said it, just an extra 1000lbs on 12,000+ flights annually is a huge cost.

 

[bbmikej]

What would cause an airline to do this? If they were that needing of the crew member they could have guaranteed them a positive space seat by getting them a ticket space permitting or put them on the next flight, however if it was a more time sensitive issue then they could have called in another crew to man the flight that the deadheading crew member was supposed to be flying.

Deadheads are normally positive space. Could have been the last flight out of a hub to a station and the airline needed the crew there that night. What would make them return another carrier's flight? The world may never know.

 

[Mainline_or_bust]

Our crews can’t take off more then planned TOW which is annoying and the result of an ETOPs mistake long ago. What that means is I always know when they want more fuel. Good, but bad too.

Anyway even if I know I planned him with more then he needs if I get a call for more there’s no arguments. At my first regional I challenged crews a bit and questioned them because I didn’t know better. It was my first job and I had not realized my operational control superseded company demands. I am one of the lower fuel planning dispatchers in the office but when he calls he gets as much as he wants.

Fuel police isn’t in my job description, and plus on shorter flights when the cost to carry that 3,000 lbs is only $40 dollars that jumpy crew might be the first to divert. A diversion costs 10s of thousands of dollars for us. How many flights can crews call and ask for a little extra before a single diversion makes up for all of it...?

 

[DogwoodLynx]

Our crews can’t take off more then planned TOW which is annoying and the result of an ETOPs mistake long ago. What that means is I always know when they want more fuel. Good, but bad too.

Anyway even if I know I planned him with more then he needs if I get a call for more there’s no arguments. At my first regional I challenged crews a bit and questioned them because I didn’t know better. It was my first job and I had not realized my operational control superseded company demands. I am one of the lower fuel planning dispatchers in the office but when he calls he gets as much as he wants.

Fuel police isn’t in my job description, and plus on shorter flights when the cost to carry that 3,000 lbs is only $40 dollars that jumpy crew might be the first to divert. A diversion costs 10s of thousands of dollars for us. How many flights can crews call and ask for a little extra before a single diversion makes up for all of it...?

Those are valid points

 

[derriko]

Very surprised more airlines don't have policies on the fuel adding. I can't remember Republic's policy, but I do know there was one. Here at Allegiant though, there's pilot discretionary fuel. They can add up to 1k without notifying us. If Its 1,001 lbs. then they "are supposed" to contact us and we can have a discussion, and then amend the release. It even blocks the crew from doing their W&B if their departure fuel is over 2,000.

Back on topic, one of my colleagues has gotten this call not too long ago: "Though the minimums are legal, they are below my personal minimums so I don't feel comfortable operating this flight." My jaw dropped on that one. Let me say that guy got a pretty funny nickname that stuck around for a while.

My personal favorite, and I don't rag on the crews too hard for this as its 100x more common for us to be familiar with t/o alternates than for flight crews. When amending on a takeoff alternate, they ask "how much fuel does that add?" I guess hypothetically if you have a 45 minute flight, and the t/o alternate is 60 minutes away, you hypothetically could require more fuel haha!

 

[bbmikej]

Ohh Ohh!! I have another one!

CA: Why aren't we getting our takeoff numbers?

ME: Looks like you are over your Max ZFW.

CA: Can we get a closer alternate or just sit out here for a while to burn some fuel off to get under our weight?