The best way to fly VFR in the UK is to talk to nobody unless it is a radar unit.
And all CAS transits are done by radar units. Is there any exception? You always get a custom txp code too.
Non radar units are a waste of time, unless needed for something specific e.g. a handover to London Control for IFR. They need a lot of radio comms, which neither they nor anybody else gets any benefit from.
Alpha_Floor wrote:
every time I have been asked to “give my life story”, if I did forget to say just one of those items they would ask it: “G-ABCD, confirm your aircraft type” or “confirm your point of departure” or whatever.
Yes – you need to give them the bits they want but much of it they don’t want. They will want your type. I’ve never known a destination airfield want to know my airfield of departure – apart from anything else they PROB90 have it already from a PPR request or an FPL if there is one. There is a guy who posts on here sometimes who does YouTube videos flying around the UK and he ALWAYS forgets his aircraft type and has to be prompted for it.
On the bits they always want, what one needs to do is find a way of wrapping it all into a rapid initial call, e.g. “G-ABCD is a TB10 out of Exeter for Redhill” which you can use as a kind of ‘starting stub’ that you build other things onto depending on what the ATCO is likely to want. This takes up much less airtime than the typical PPL “Errr….. PA28….. errrrrr….from Gloster……errrrrrr….. to errrrrr…… Stapleford……errr…..2 POB……errrrr…… VFR”. Most of this is because they are still thinking of what to say while they say it, frantically trying to recall all the things in the ‘standard’ call and usually eventually covering them all but not in the prescribed order!
Ultimately it comes down to who you are, what you are, where you are and what you want. Follow that and you won’t go far wrong!
Alpha_Floor wrote:
This is telling isn’t it? They couldn’t care less whether you are IFR or VFR. I say it anyway for the record.
OCAS they will presume you are VFR unless you say otherwise, or unless they see you squawking 2000. But you’re right, for flight OCAS it hardly matters to them.
Alpha_Floor wrote:
It’s usually only the airfield AFISOs who ask for POB.
Yes! They like that one.
Agree with @Peter, when flying OCAS generally no need to talk to anyone and if you must then really only to a radar unit who can offer you a traffic service. A basic service is almost completely pointless. Very little reason ever to call up the non-radar London Info unless you want a flight plan activating or just like to have someone on the radio as you cross the sea. The problem is the training establishment positions London Info as the default en-route unit to work, so on sunny days it’s full of what you describe – endless puddlejumpers passing lots of information for absolutely no reason at all.
Graham wrote:
The PPL training establishment drills into UK pilots that the ATC request to “pass your message” or “pass your details” must always be replied to with a full-and-proper statement of everything delivered in a particular format – reg/type/departure/destination/persons on board/flight rules/route/position/altitude/estimate for next waypoint – popularly known as giving your ‘life story’ or ‘inside leg measurement’.
I just ordered a single, readily available part for a UK-built car on line, from a UK-based company. I then received the following series of five emails:
1. Order requested
2. Order accepted
3. Order in progress
4. Invoice attached
5. Order fulfilled
Normally I’d expect two emails, one to acknowledge the order and one to send a tracking link once shipped. In this case, nowhere was tracking info explicitly supplied, although when I downloaded the invoice and read it carefully the number (unlinked) could be found, without making reference to the shipping company used. Then, knowing that a Z in the number generally means UPS I could manually cut and paste into the appropriate website to get shipping status.
I think these are the same kind of people who don’t supply a street number or postal code in their house address, just the cute name they’ve given the house themselves.
BTW, the brake fluid reservoir that I ordered has one level line on it, not labelled high or low, plus a note on the cap saying the level should not be higher than 10-mm from “the top”, whatever that means. After pondering that for a while, by measuring the distance of the single level line from the rim of the reservoir you can determine that the single line is more than 10-mm below the rim, and therefore it is likely the low level line. However, with that said, nothing else on the car is metric. You can’t make this stuff up. 
UK-written service manuals are often awesome so if I’d looked in ‘the book’ this might have been explained in precise detail.
One is forced to the conclusion that making things over fussy, unconventional and complex is a widespread although not universal UK cultural trait Somehow they muddle through, as in the UK vaccination success story, but not always in the obvious or most efficient manner.
Just my observation, as a fan of cultural immersion.
@Silvaire Nothing surprising there!
What sort of car is it? And of course you know that the exact level is unimportant so long as you’ve got a sensible amount in the reservoir. I can’t recall if the brake and clutch reservoirs on my Spitfire have any level markings – I just make sure they’re filled up to perhaps half an inch below the rim.
BTW, my house doesn’t have and has almost certainly never had a street number – it’s not in any kind of row. The name is registered with the Post Office, so it appears on all address databases. I didn’t choose the name, it was here when I bought it! The house of my nearest neighbour has had the same name since at least 1794 (I believe George Washington was President?)
I’ve noticed that nearly all buildings in the US have a numbered street address. Many/most non-residential buildings in the UK do not and are just addressed by their name/description. Houses are generally only numbered if they’re in a row of some sort.
:-)
An old Jaguar.
I am genuinely a fan of cultural immersion. I’m just having fun
As a fan of cultural immersion myself, this is probably my Germanic side, but wouldn’t it be so much simpler to just follow SERA? My experience as a foreign pilot (admittedly I rarely fly VFR Int’l) the magic word is not pls but unable when being asked to complicate things that are not standard rules of airmanship. I’ve posted about my experiences with ATC before in the UK, adm I simply explain to them I’m on an IFR FlightPlan and what I’m expecting of them…
Frans wrote:
Do you know actually if Norwegian CAA is very hard on pilots how bust a bit of CAS? Is there a zero tolerance regime or are minimum airspace infringements more or less tolerated (at least when in contact with Polaris)?
I have never heard of anything.
Graham wrote:
Less is more, I feel.Absolutely. Thats why I love Swiss ATC for example. No ‘life stories’ needed, just callsign, position and request. Further instructions will follow directly, they keep their words always very shortened. The one exception to this is of course FIS. Zurich Info also says “pass your message”. Geneva doesn’t, but the idea is the same. They want to hear: Callsign, aircraft type, departure, destination, position and routing. In Germany, Langen Info even doesn’t need the routing, but quite a few German pilots keep talking to FIS as if every flight detail might safe their life.
I have never heard of anything.
Good to know!
ATC ELP is a huge factor in this. The “Germanic” countries have normally very good ATC ELP. Swiss is really good. Nice and short. France is variable – as you can see in my videos where often even the most basic words are clearly not understood, plus the drawn-out accent which is hard to work out. Spain used to be really bad although has improved in recent years. I have found Italy good, recently. Benelux is normally excellent.
The business of reading out War and Peace is possible only in your own language, although Brits seem to manage it in the most cringeworthy way quite well in N France
If ATC is comfortable with English they will use it more effectively, with fewer and more meaningful words. And the converse applies; a pilot will tend get a worse service if ATC doesn’t really want to talk to him in English.
I then received the following series of five emails:
They probably bought the same crappy online shop software as almost everybody else
LFHNflightstudent wrote:
As a fan of cultural immersion myself, this is probably my Germanic side, but wouldn’t it be so much simpler to just follow SERA? My experience as a foreign pilot (admittedly I rarely fly VFR Int’l) the magic word is not pls but unable when being asked to complicate things that are not standard rules of airmanship. I’ve posted about my experiences with ATC before in the UK, adm I simply explain to them I’m on an IFR FlightPlan and what I’m expecting of them…
SERA is a harmonisation of national regulations in the EU as mandated by the European Commission. Thus politically, the chances of the UK ‘just following it’ are slim to none. It is also incorrect to define anything non-SERA (although I’m not 100% sure that’s what you meant) as ‘non-standard rules of airmanship’. SERA is EU-only and has no special status as the ‘right’ way to do things.
As has been posted before, the airspace and ATC mess in the UK is largely a product of a flawed privatisation philosophy and process which removed all ‘infrastructure’ status from anything aviation-related and resulted in a series of private fiefdoms where, with a few exceptions, nothing happens unless some user directly pays for it and a private enterprise chooses to provide it.
As you say, if you tell them you are on an IFR flightplan and put your foot down regarding your expectations then the system will generally accommodate you. This is generally true of all ATC-related interaction, not just IFR – the key is to remember you as the pilot are in charge and that ATC are there to help, not hinder.
