Airline/Airport/Travel questions and queries

colbarr · 14-02-2017 10:45pm

Do pilots lose out on flying hours if they arrive early and vice versa if they're delayed?

Locker10a · 14-02-2017 11:00pm

colbarr wrote: »

Do pilots lose out on flying hours if they arrive early and vice versa if they're delayed?

I don't really understand what you mean? Could you explain more?

Tenger · 14-02-2017 11:55pm

colbarr wrote: »

Do pilots lose out on flying hours if they arrive early and vice versa if they're delayed?

It would depend on the airline working conditions.
Flight crew are paid a salary, rather than paid by the hour. However their actual flight hours (called block hours) are calculated very closely. This is the time from aircraft pushback until arrival onstand. This is a big indicator of seniority and experience over a pilots career. EG. "7500 hrs on type"
Whether they are early or late on a given day might have an impact on some sort of internal company productivity payment. But they dont have a massive impact on that. They can do their best to shorten turnarounds and liase with ground crew and cabin crew but often its up to the weather/tech/ATC/airport/tow truck Gods to let you be early, on-time or late!

colbarr · 15-02-2017 1:18am

I'm not talking about the money side of things. I'm wondering about the block hours. What do you mean by they're "calculated very closely"?

My train of thought here is that a first officer who is, say, 20 hours away from having the required hours to be promoted to captain might spend the next two weeks accidentally delaying a flight to gain hours.

But on the flipside, a pilot who is very efficient with their time management, or get stuck in a massive tailwind on a regular basis might lose out on hours as a result.

What are the general rules regarding this sort of thing?

smurfjed · 15-02-2017 4:37am

@colbarr, its just a case of tough luck, hours are from block out to block in, if a specific flight takes longer or shorter than average there is nothing that you can do about it.
However from a money point of view, in some airlines crews are paid salaries and additional block hours, credit hours, overtime and productivity payments, we have had a few cases of people releasing the parking brake early or setting it late in order to gain a few minutes per flight , this rapidly adds up when doing 4 flights a day, once the company had proof of their actions, they were warned then fired.

Donegal Storm · 15-02-2017 5:49am

schemingbohemia wrote: »

Is that midnight in the map? Flight time was supposed to be 2100 local time. Would flight take off towards sea or stay above land? If as Fred says other flights were arriving and departing without issue surely that should help the claim?

It's a 12 hour accumulation from 12pm to 12am, most of the strikes offshore are between 6pm and 9pm. Can't answer your other questions sorry

joeysoap · 15-02-2017 8:00pm

schemingbohemia wrote: »

But is that not Ryanair's fault for not having a more locally based engineer? I know the whole system would probably fall apart if that was required but it was actually the location of the Engineer that caused the delay (Stansted) rather than the lightning itself?

I know I'm clutching at straws here.......

Maybe try putting in the flight no here and see what they come up with?

https://myflightdelayed.com/

Fred Swanson · 15-02-2017 8:07pm

This post has been deleted.

martinsvi · 16-02-2017 4:39pm

schemingbohemia wrote: »

Not sure I'm posting in the right area. Mods please move if needs be.

My folks were delayed more than 3 hours on a Ryanair flight from Nice to Dublin on 3rd February, due to leave at 2100 left after 0000. They were told locally it was a technical issue and that someone was being flown from Stansted to fix the issue.
However, lo and behold, when they made their claim to Ryanair it turns out to have been an electrical storm that caused the delay so no compensation payable.
Can anyone confirm if electrical storms on that date caused delays to other aircraft? Doesn't seem to have effected the flight from Stansted to Nice with the engineer on board. Anyone able to direct me somewhere where i'd find this information?

If the airline is using the extraordinary circumstances clause, it's them who have to provide evidence that this was indeed the case

here are some of the relevant judgments http://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites/transport/files/themes/passengers/air/doc/2015-summary-of-the-most-relevant-ecj-judgements.pdf

"An airline can be exempted compensation in case of a long delay or a cancellation if it can prove extraordinary circumstances. The ECJ clarified that a technical problem which comes to light during aircraft maintenance or is caused by failure to maintain an aircraft cannot be regarded as “extraordinary circumstances”. Moreover, the fact that an air carrier has complied with the minimum rules on maintenance of an aircraft cannot in itself suffice to establish that that carrier has taken all reasonable measures to relieve that air carrier ofits obligation to pay compensation.
Case C-549/07 (Wallentin-Hermann) "

If you look further, generally courts tend to agree that aircraft breakdowns are not extraordinary and lighting strikes are to be expected if you poke skies with a shiny metal tube:

"Judge Melissa Clarke ruled in favour of two passengers in an appeal case against Monarch Airlines at Reading County Court. The passengers, Michael Evans and his partner Julie Lee, were awarded €600 (£450) each for a five-hour flight delay.
In this case, Monarch did not have spare aircraft available at Gatwick or Hurghada so passengers had to wait for the plane that had been struck by lightning to be checked in Gatwick

Monarch tried to argue that this should have been considered an 'unexpected flight safety shortcoming', which is one of the events the regulations state might be an extraordinary circumstance.

But Her Honour Judge Melissa Clarke ruled: "Damage caused by a lightning strike may well be an unexpected flight safety shortcoming, but that does not make it an exceptional circumstance [...]an unexpected flight safety shortcoming is only an exceptional circumstance if it is not inherent within the normal exercise of the carrier's activity"

vicwatson · 27-02-2017 6:21pm

Is this aircraft registered in Ireland ?? If so why, how? Is obviously legit. I'm basing the question as the registration begins EI?

"LIVE First commercial flight for Alitalia Boeing 777-200 (EI-FNI) operating #AZ784 from Rome to Tokyo"

Fred Swanson · 27-02-2017 6:23pm

This post has been deleted.

vicwatson · 27-02-2017 6:35pm

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Aha. Cheers. Know which one?

smurfjed · 27-02-2017 6:42pm

EI-FNI THE BOEING COMPANY BOEING 777-2Q8 LAND AEROPLANE 19/04/2016 297556 2003 28688 4CA633 GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY GE90-94B 2 AERCAP IRELAND LIMITED

Nibs05 · 28-02-2017 11:52am

Quick question,

Traveling to stanstead in march with Ryanair, only hand luggage and will be using the app to check in etc, can I use security in T2 ?

Fred Swanson · 28-02-2017 11:54am

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pilly · 28-02-2017 12:03pm

Nibs05 wrote: »

Quick question,

Traveling to stanstead in march with Ryanair, only hand luggage and will be using the app to check in etc, can I use security in T2 ?

You can but why would you want to?

joeysoap · 28-02-2017 12:48pm

L

pilly wrote: »

You can but why would you want to?

It's more upmarket

Seriously though, IMO, security has improved a lot at Dublin airport and in particular at T1. Much better then most airports.

Fred Swanson · 28-02-2017 12:51pm

This post has been deleted.

pilly · 28-02-2017 12:54pm

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Usually but then you've to add on your walking time to the Ryanair gates. Not really important I suppose. I was just wondering if there was another advantage.

January · 28-02-2017 1:55pm

Different shops in T2

SweetCaliber · 02-03-2017 1:30am

Anyone know with Ryanair, say if I was to book a seat for myself, but travelling with 5 other people, if I book a seat, will they get allocated beside me or will they get random seats?

I know Ryanair tries to keep groups together, so by buying one seat for myself, will the others be beside me or does the algorithm work differently?

Thanks!

joeysoap · 02-03-2017 1:49am

Afaik if you are all on the one booking you won't be able to buy one seat, but chances are you wont be totally split up anyway.

JCX BXC · 02-03-2017 1:54am

joeysoap wrote: »

Afaik if you are all on the one booking you won't be able to buy one seat, but chances are you wont be totally split up anyway.

You can, and if you're travelling with a child you're forced to purchase a seat for at least one adult, but not everyone else.

TPMP · 06-03-2017 7:53pm

Hey guys, has anyone booked with British Airways through a travel agent? I'm flying to Hong kong in October and when making the booking the travel agent asked me if I wanted to buy seats for the flight, I declined. Now I have changed my mind, I can't purchase my seat through their website for some reason. Does anyone know if it's possible to do this after the booking has been made?

Fred Swanson · 06-03-2017 7:56pm

This post has been deleted.

TPMP · 06-03-2017 8:43pm

Fred Swanson wrote: »

You will have to go back to the agent.

Ok thanks.

shar01 · 06-03-2017 9:02pm

Has anyone booked a bizplus ticket and subsequently had to change flights (same destination, different dates)?

How was the experience? Easy enough to change?

Ta,

S.

Captain_Crash · 07-03-2017 9:10am

TPMP wrote: »

Hey guys, has anyone booked with British Airways through a travel agent? I'm flying to Hong kong in October and when making the booking the travel agent asked me if I wanted to buy seats for the flight, I declined. Now I have changed my mind, I can't purchase my seat through their website for some reason. Does anyone know if it's possible to do this after the booking has been made?

Once fully paid you'll receive your booking reference. You can use this to log onto your flight booking on the BA website and reserve seats from there. If you have already paid in full then you should already have a this reference number.

TPMP · 07-03-2017 9:16am

Captain_Crash wrote: »

Once fully paid you'll receive your booking reference. You can use this to log onto your flight booking on the BA website and reserve seats from there. If you have already paid in full then you should already have a this reference number.

The trip is half paid for, but I already received the booking reference and logged on to the BA website. All my details were there except the option to purchase seats. So once it's paid fully I'll have the option to purchase? And what if I go into the travel agent before then?

shar01 · 07-03-2017 9:32am

TPMP wrote: »

The trip is half paid for, but I already received the booking reference and logged on to the BA website. All my details were there except the option to purchase seats. So once it's paid fully I'll have the option to purchase? And what if I go into the travel agent before then?

Is the window for booking seats open?

Airline/Airport/Travel questions and queries

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