@Bluebeard: good to hear that you got the apology. The essence of what I wrote on that blog post is that software has been written by several parties to accommodate the Dutch Marechaussee requirements and not only for flights to/from the UK (except maybe onlinegar.com). Not sure why you get this “infected” warning. The SSL certificate is valid. Will do an extra scan of the server. Thanks for letting me know.
Update: this morning I got a courteous apology from the “General Aviation Center” of the Marechaussee, that my GENDEC was not correctly distributed at Seppe.
Wow, apologies are normally not in the official procedures book, I am surprised!
AeroPlus, that link sets off an “infected” alarm for me.
I do frequently use OnlineGAR. But as far as I can see the Netherlands-format output from OnlineGAR is available only if the flight is to or from the UK.
Some of the suggestions here are premised on having access to a printer. It is not practical to print stuff when you are on the road on a flexi-itinerary, that leads to needing to carry a 12 volt printer and other pre-21st century scenarios.
OnlineGAR.com’s website does not allow for self-assembly of a report even though (in my case) all the necessary information is held there. It is designed – understandably – for flights to or from the UK only.
Maybe I’ll just make up some standard forms of my own design containing all the information commonly demanded about occupants, and carry a few printed blanks. Actually GENDEC is a misnomer, the ICAO form of GENDEC does not require passenger details of the sort now required by border controls. Btw I note the form linked via the website of EHMZ asks for details of when the aircraft was last sprayed with insecticide, must get some flykiller ;-)
All this heightened border control stuff is a symptom of the rise of xenophobia in countries’ political climates and voter attitudes, with suspicion of foreigners and pressure on Schengen; we should try not to blame the plods charged with enforcing it.
Cobalt wrote:
I don’t know if they now insist on a particular format or colour of paper.
Well I hope nothing with fancy colors does go via fax/aftn terminals, you can only send colored fax if you just bought the two colored fax machines from the same shop/manufacturer 
Even for GAR, the only time I got a reply to my email (from French side), it was asking to resend in .doc format (someone did not manage to open that .xls), so always good idea to carry a print in paper or have it ready in your tablet
Yes it is a great idea to print off a copy of the GAR and carry that. It has come in handy a few times.
The problem is when an airport wants the information some time in advance.
AFAICT this is a standard hate among bizjet pilots who have to deal with a myriad of these websites all the time. Most just want to email the details to the handler.
In terms of IT it would not be hard to write a script which presents a uniform user interface and forwards the info to the appropriate website, or even emails it directly to the airport or the handler. I think the challenges are
)Bluebeard wrote:
in a paper-free manner
Don’t bother. Carry a paper “gendec” unless they want an electronic copy. When the Netherlands started asking for this “gendec” some five or so years ago, they seemed to be happy with anything that had the required information on it, so the UK GAR form was sufficient of which I luckily had a copy. I don’t know if they now insist on a particular format or colour of paper.
It used to be the case that in the UK, with over 50 police forces, if the local “Special Branch” (bizarre name) didn’t get your GAR form for whatever reason – e.g. no paper in their fax machine – it was deemed not to have existed. Thankfully this situation has been cleaned up with centralised processing.
The police who greeted us at Seppe did not have a coherent explanation as to why they appeared at all, if they did not get the Gendec. Possibly it was the flight plan, filed some hours earlier through Skydemon, they could not say.
I am no wiser than before this episode as to how to deal effectively with Dutch police in or out requirements in a paper-free manner.
I’ve previously made up a spreadsheet with separate auto-populated output formats to satisfy Irish and French requirements, maybe I will add a Dutch output format so this could be emailed to the relevant airfield to deal with as it seems there is no central address.
As the data any securocrat may require is limited to certain fields, perhaps someone should develop an all-purpose app to cover non-Schengen requirements and equivalents (Greece for example, Switzerland). The recipients of the data of course want all the inputting into the recipient’s own database to be done by the user.
Bah.
Sadly the world is filling up with assorted vermin, spongers and wide boys, who set up yet another website for “managing airport traffic” and with some smooth talking bull they convince the airport manager (who more often than not is well behind the curve anyway) to sign up to it…
As you found out, the police (everywhere) couldn’t care less if you complied with your duties, if they didn’t get the email. It’s an SOP…
