Olivia does not give any feedback.
That’s not true, btw. Changes the BRIA does are (at least sometimes) reflected in what you can see in Olivia.
But really, you call the BRIA every time you filed a flight plan via Olivia?
why spend bandwidth asking ATC?
To avoid having different ideas on how to proceed, leading to surprises at least, as this thread shows. Saving radio bandwidth is a non-argument, IMO, because now we have 8.33kHz (just kidding), and the airports that use a STAR are not those with a very high traffic level, otherwise they’d use vectoring, point merge and what not.
I still don’t get why you’re so keen on flight planning the STAR/arrival procedure – you simply cannot know it at flight planning time, and relying on the filed procedure is IMO actively dangerous, because it’s way too often wrong and can very easily lead to undesirable situations if not clarified with the approach controller, as this thread clearly shows.
Another argument not to place too much emphasis on the filed route (as if there was any more needed) is that as far as I know the ATCO doesn’t have your filed route on his strip, only the entry and exit points of his sector. Sure he can retrieve your flight plan if he’s bored, but he won’t normally do that.
i never use IFPS reroute. i also never file a STAR unless it comes up in RR. i look at the typical arrivals to get an idea of the waypoints normally used. When i get near my last waypoint i ask if they have an arrival or if i can expect vectors.
Same for me.
you upgraded to Windows Phone?
No; still on the 808. The 1020 is like an iPhone… Far too dysfunctional for me 
Recently I had the opportunity to watch an ATCO doing his work. It was departure and not arrival but it was clear that all he did was give everybody the same instructions to leave his sector to other sectors in a way pre-coordinate with the adjoining sectors. Individual work was only done within his own sector and that was with some IFR training flights.
The strips did not contain anything beyond the basic information about the aircraft and call sign.
When flying IFR in the lower airspace portion it seems that what you have Flight Planned hardly matches your actual routing. Fly over Frankfurt at FL100 ad you will know why…
In the lower Airspace it’s much more harder to predict the actual radar sector load, There are strategic and tactical decisions from ATC perspective. If the Miltary become active suddenly then things become even more complicated. Eurocontrol gives your flight plan approval what you will get in real time as a clearance is a different story.. IMHO. Outside dense TMA’s etc the FPLN way-points seem to follow the clearances! BTW I never used eurocontrol IFPS re-route!
I use autorouter, file the proposed RTE through my ARO over a website. Call them 10 minutes later if it was processed correctly by ectrl . In most of the cases this works flawless for me…I carry the full briefing pack including the approved Routing by ectrl…
still don’t get why you’re so keen on flight planning the STAR/arrival procedure – you simply cannot know it at flight planning time, and relying on the filed procedure is IMO actively
The whole point is that I have so far never filed a STAR. I file to a convenient waypoint published in the RAD A/D ARR DCT limits document (usually the first waypoint on a STAR). Still the STAR waypoints are added to the waypoint list received from EuroFPL.
Furthermore, one of the reasons why I am so keen on the RAD (in case anyone wonders why I keep bringing that up) is that at one point I was having a real hard time finding valid routes departing from LFPT (first waypoint on the en-route segment), and I found no hints in the AIP. On top of that there were some bugs in EuroFPL that did not accept some routes that should have been valid (POGO – DCT) which made it very confusing . RAD had the answer.
seems that what you have Flight Planned hardly matches your actual routing. Fly over Frankfurt at FL100 ad you will know why…
Thank God that you often do not have to fly the planned route! That can in many cases shave your flight time considerably! Some routes I have seen had something like 40% overhead.
Europe has FUA Flexible Use of Airspace which in reality requires flexibility from the Pilot…
Fly over Frankfurt at FL100 ad you will know why
That would never validate in the past. The min was FL120-130. Has this changed?
