Slots are irritating but nobody seems to be considering the possibility that they are imposed by DFS and not by the airport management.
That quote was actually from a post by some rep of Aerops, not me, but the problems they had were nothing to do with server performance, bandwidth, etc. Claiming that shows a deep failure to understand what was done wrong.
nobody seems to be considering the possibility that they are imposed by DFS and not by the airport management.
It could be the airport, DFS, or even the Swiss approach controller body.
I don’t think the “slot irritation” is the issue; it is the implementation which was set up in a way where there is a mad scramble for the slots.
I’m afraid AeroPS looks like a train crash – both from the implementation perspective and the customer support.
Just like @eurogaguest1980 I do this for living and … well, from what I read here it is not ideal, to put it mildly.
I think @sebastian_g has done this stuff before 
Some solutions are specialised, some are obvious. Doctolib has been mentioned. It’s even been written in Ruby on Rails so you can get €1500/day doing this… what is not to like?
Whether one could have reasonably expected someone to buy a load of slots to cover an entire day, say for €500, for maximum arrival flexibility, is interesting. In terms of both geo-cultural and type-specific-community aspects it doesn’t surprise me at all
I got my slot for Friday 21st, but if the flight (from Croatia) is not possible due to wx, what do I do? For GA, this is an unbelievably idiotic system. I would have included a facility for trading slots. Many slots will be wasted due to natural reasons…
Idiotic, especially as EDNY tower will kick out your flight plan if ETA doesn’t fall within the slot, and they issue the SUSP shortly before EOBT, when you are not in a position to re-file. It is either how they work, or done for maximum punishment value. And the “purist” Autorouter model does not allow EOBT adjustment for a given ETA, which is why I file these flight plans using EuroFPL (Eurocontrol itself allows ~ 1.5x tweaking – see previous threads).
I am sorry Patrick that your friend had a go at you and got you to post a complaint.
Why do you say that? I specifically pointed out in my post that this is not the case. Is that hard to believe?
Peter wrote:
The following was posted, apparently by the Aerops guy, on a German domestic site (google translation). I am posting it here so Patrick can see both sides are able to air their views.
I’ve read the original. I agree with your implied assessment. The responses in the German forum (which is really not known for treating people in a nice and balanced way) are a little bit more balanced than the views expressed here. As said, I feel they should have better stayed away from this and definitely shouldn’t have written the above quoted post. It’s far too emotional for a company response and of course the assertion that the problem may be with poor internet connections on the users’ side or that PayPal was overloaded with the traffic are nonsense.
All I’m trying to say is that it’s a company that – beside the repeated Aero slot mess – is getting some things right as well and it seems fair to me to point that out.
because the obvious intention is that the “agent” becomes the “sole agent”. We see this everywhere. We even had it at EGKA where some years ago one “business” got established as the sole processor for traffic > 1500kg.
I think it would be great if there were a handful of competitors offering comparable services to avoid a monopoly situation.
For what it’s worth – I booked my slots last night and it worked pretty much okay. Obviously the limited choice of slots is a bit ridiculous.
The responses in the German forum (which is really not known for treating people in a nice and balanced way) are a little bit more balanced than the views expressed here
I would debate that. I would expect a German company to be allocated a huge chunk of credit, and it didn’t really get any. Some of the comments are quite, shall we say, accurate I saw one comment, from a well known “social media resident”, was deleted 
All I’m trying to say is that it’s a company that – beside the repeated Aero slot mess – is getting some things right as well and it seems fair to me to point that out.
By far the hardest thing to do in their airport billing / payment operation is Marketing. Airports are notoriously difficult to sell “new things” to – especially things which a) they don’t actually need and b) cost them (or somebody) a fee. This is off topic here – Aerops thread. But even there when I asked what does it do, the reply was very minimal. Seriously, after you have landed, about the smallest fish to fry is paying. Sorting out a taxi under €100 is more fun
And if there are some Aerops-only airports, that is a really big problem coming up. Yet another bloody “app”. It’s like parking apps. A new one for every car park. We need that like a hole in the head.
In the long run, any “app” business is doomed because they have to keep updating the app for ever. Often, every new version of IOS or Android…
I think it would be great if there were a handful of competitors offering comparable services to avoid a monopoly situation.
The whole point is to have no competition. Competition soaks up profits. Well, there is one payment method which basically works: it’s called a “credit card” And even there we see outfits like TOTAL or AIR BP trying to strong-arm customers into other payment methods from which these outfits can skim off a margin.
Anyway, as posted by others, there is some weird politics going on around the show, and Aerops got in on the money stream, and they will probably get the job again next year.
I wonder what the probability is of getting a slot on say Thursday 1300, if Friday is no good wx-wise. So I am looking at other options like EDTM & EDJA. Both have customs and Immigration (PN) and are doable by taxi to Hagnau.
Peter wrote:
And if there are some Aerops-only airports, that is a really big problem coming up.
The solution that we are looking at to implement at our airfield will not require visiting pilots to use the app. Payment can be done via a web form and e.g. Apple Pay or credit card, accessible via a QR code near the C office sign.
Of course it is not rocket science. But it’s good to have at least one provider offering this. As said, I wouldn’t mind seeing some competition in the market. But frankly, if anyone who cared to setup something similar read these threads here, even with the best of intentions, they’d probably be appalled to invest any time, passion, or money into it, looking at how much hostility is likely going to be thrown at them for even daring to try.
Patrick wrote:
But frankly, if anyone who cared to setup something similar read these threads here, even with the best of intentions, they’d probably be appalled to invest any time, passion, or money into it, looking at how much hostility is likely going to be thrown at them for even daring to try.
@Patrick, I’m afraid that level of hostility is pretty much the norm these days.
But frankly, if anyone who cared to setup something similar read these threads here, even with the best of intentions, they’d probably be appalled to invest any time, passion, or money into it, looking at how much hostility is likely going to be thrown at them for even daring to try.
Patrick, if you have posted that supportive sentiment in Germany, I must have missed it
I don’t think the mission-criticality is being understood. This wasn’t some hobby project done for “charity”:
So yeah a lot of people are going to be quite upset. Here, they got squeezed into a corner and shafted. Nobody likes that. This isn’t some minor hassle. This is really big. You are arranging a big trip – for a large chunk of GA, EDNY is their first significant trip in that year – probably with passengers, personal/social/work schedules, and then the booking system doesn’t work. People are going to be absolutely livid.
Yes I know lots of people are just rude (I know from 45 years in business that selling direct to the public is often unpleasant, and I also know that selling to traders who sell to the public is hard because they tend to be quite nasty too) but here it was to be expected IF it failed.
Payment can be done via a web form and e.g. Apple Pay or credit card, accessible via a QR code near the C office sign.
That would be a great idea. But it won’t have much marketing drive because nobody is going to make a margin on it Well, I guess someone could set up and run that website and charge for that. Most airports have a website but setting up that sort of stuff is a whole extra level. To take CC payments you either have to comply with PCI/DSS (an EU reg and a huge hassle) or use a 3rd party payment processor (e.g. Paypal) and the code for connecting to these isn’t 100% reliable (as I know from work where we did that). A full time available support person is needed; basically you are running an online shop.
BTW can anyone offer an opinion on whether EDTM & EDJA are going to be able to accept traffic during Aero? I will email them, of course.
EDTM issued this NOTAM:
Will be active in 8 days: C0993/23 NOTAMN
Q) EDGG/QFALT/IV/NBO/A /000/999/4803N00922E005
A) EDTM
B) 2304170000
C) 2304232359
E) EXP DLA FOR IFR RNP VIA RAVED DUE TO AERO 2023 AND POSS HIGH TFC AND FREQ CONGESTION. CREATED: 27 Mar 2023 09:04:00 SOURCE: EUECYIYN
