I picked up a card in Sywell yesterday.
There is a Border Force number +44 300123 2012 for:
- Medical emergencies
- Air Ambulances
- Other emergencies requiring a change to already submitted information
- last minute changes to a previous submitted GAR
I would not bother cancelling a GAR. The police (it’s the same people who actually turn up for all the GAR related stuff) look at the flight plans etc before they go somewhere.
Hi Peter, I would say its a courtesy issue to cancel in particular if you plan to return to an uncontrolled airfield. Imagine this guys show up there awaiting you to land. Better to cancel and to resubmit. Makes you being received much more friendly:) Legally, all above said correct.
I would say its a courtesy issue to cancel in particular if you plan to return to an uncontrolled airfield. Imagine this guys show up there awaiting you to land.
They don’t show up unless either:
1. You activated a flight plan (not just filed it, but activated it). The use this to take account of any delays you had on departure to avoid wasting time waiting.
2. They have other reasons to think that you’ve departed without a flight plan (eg a report from ATC, or someone at the airfield your landing at, or some other intelligence).
If they were so bothered about people not cancelling them, they would have put that on the instructions page.
Thanks for the above comments which are of course helpful.
Wouldn’t it be great if UKBF made it clear that one doesn’t have to cancel a GAR if the flight is delayed or cancelled, because they work from the flight plan records : no activation, no need for UKBF to go to the airfield to check on the passengers, if indeed that is how they monitor things.
I have no idea who to complain to at UKBF about the lack of clarity on cancelling / delaying a GAR, and no idea if they would listen.
I have been filing GARs for non-flown flights for 10 years. Never had any comeback. The police know that half of all flights get cancelled at the last moment, due to wx mostly. So they look at the flight plans (I am told by them that they have access to the same database from which flight plans can be retrieved later for S&R purposes) and they see the DEP and ARR messages (or they phone the airport(s) to ask) and they manage their “intercepts” accordingly.
Once, they had been waiting for me for ages, following a flight which was 2hrs longer than filed due to headwind 
Huh? GAR is a UK thing. Immigration at EBAW knows nothing about (or at least has no jurisdiction over)
UK GARs…
Just sayin’…
Why reacting so strange?
It is just another source of information, just like this forum. Or do you verify all the information you receive here by the official source on a bank holiday? I called them earlier with a question and they also needed my filed GAR document before departure. When I called him with my question (after I searched the official GAR document online but didn’t find a clear answer) they didn’t say they don’t know anything about it,, only I don’t have to cancel it… If you work already many years with immigration clearance for the UK, (I am not the first non-flown flight) I suppose they know the answer also and if they don’t, they would tell you.
We clearly have wires crossed.
I will try one more time: you refer to the GAR (which is UK thing) in the same sentence as “Immigration at EBAW”. I pointed out that one thing has nothing to do with the other.
Your last post didn’t really help in clarifying that. Sorry.
If somebody else understood it, please speak up.
OnlineGAR allows you to cancel. The Isle of Man lot take their GAR by email so I just email them and say it’s been canceled.
No flight plan is required for my typical flight (IOM-UK or IOM-NI) and it’s been probably 10 years since anyone from the police has come to meet the aircraft. If I’m running late I just run late.
I did have a complaint for a cancelled flight last year, FWIW. They had missed my email (to the Fairoaks ATSU email which redirects to some top secret UKBF email).
