Ops Initial Training | FL3XX Familiarization: Timeline versus Dispatch

00:00: Get familiar with FL3XX by exploring its core flight management features.

00:03: Just as a pilot must scan multiple instruments to not end up in

00:08: an unusual attitude or veer off course, FL3XX uses will also navigate

00:12: between various modules throughout their day. The Operations or Dispatch

00:16: team will spend significant time in the Timeline and Dispatch modules.

00:20: Let’s take a look at the views and advantages of each.

00:24: First, we will look at the Timeline, the timeline provides, the greatest visual on

00:28: fleet capacity, as well as real-time movement, it is coded much

00:32: like a traffic light with green yellow and red colors.

00:35: You’ll also see magenta when changes are made,

00:38: There are actually four different timeline views. Crew

00:41: schedulers will love the Timeline Flights and Crew. Sales team members and

00:45: executives tend to prefer the Calendar, though operations team members are also

00:49: becoming raving fans there too. Bookings are of great value for accounting

00:53: to determine payment status. We are going to look at Timeline-Flights, which is a Gantt

00:57: chart. Because time is linear and this is a horizontal project management view,

01:01: we have two available time displays – UTC or Home

01:05: Base Time. UTC is great

01:07: for operations across multiple timezones. This view allows you to see flights,

01:11: tasks, notes, and maintenance events across your

01:14: fleet. You can drag and drop flights to other aircraft for swift optimization and

01:18: service recovery. You can see when delays encroach on crew legality. And the

01:22: red vertical line will always show the current time, making it easy to identify aircraft

01:26: that are or should be in flight, about to depart, or having just landed.

01:30: Click the “today” button to bring the red line back to the center left of your screen.

01:36: The “crew” toggle is what populates the crew data lines below

01:40: each flight segment. For optimal performance,

01:43: this feature is limited to one day in the past and seven

01:47: days in the future.

01:49: Hovering over the crew duty lines will give you a visualization of their actual

01:53: and max duty period and flight time, as well as required rest.

01:58: The long grain horizontal bar at the bottom of the aircraft row comes from information.

02:02: On the roster. In this example Amelia Earhart and Florence Barnes

02:07: are available as pilot and command and second-in-command on this aircraft.

02:10: Thus they are availability shows on the flights timeline.

02:14: Solid vertical bars represent flights and will show their overall color of red,

02:18: yellow, or green, depending on status of dispatch items and

02:22: phase of flight planning, tracking, or processing.

02:26: Clicking any flight will open the flight strip with more flight details and tasks

02:31: like crew assignments, FBOs, hotel, catering, permits,

02:36: fuel, and more.

02:38: When you see a vertical bar with black stripes like a barber pole, this indicates an empty

02:42: or positioning leg with zero passengers.

02:44: This visualization on the Timeline is helpful for Charter sales to know what legs

02:49: they should try to sell and for Ops to see opportunities for fleet optimization and

02:53: for service recovery from delays and maintenance.

02:56: The dispatch module is the checklist for your operations team.

02:59: This is where your short-term planners will confirm that.

03:02: Everything is green for the next day’s operations, many search, and filtering

03:06: options are available.

03:08: In Dispatch, the overall color is shown by a vertical bar on the left.

03:12: Here we can see that the current day’s flight is green and released.

03:16: The next days flights still require preparation as their overall color

03:20: is red. Operations managers should audit the Dispatch module on

03:24: a daily basis, as part of their countdown to departure, to ensure

03:27: all passengers names are entered, there are no warnings for FBO mismatches,

03:32: all fuel has been ordered, tasks have been completed and more, including

03:36: the flight release. It’s also a great check on your flight followers to ensure that

03:40: movement times are being updated in real time.

03:44: Additional training is available for the Timeline and Dispatch.

03:47: Hopefully this training highlighted some of the differences between the two modules

03:51: and why both are important for the precision of your operation.