Efficient charter sales with automated feasibility checks

When working on a massive amount of quotation requests in charter sales, it may be quite a challenge to keep track of all variables related to flight preparations and itinerary.

As Leon Sales keeps expanding with each new release, we are also stepping on the gas by constantly adding new workflow improvements. One of the biggest gamechangers for anyone dealing with charter sales is the ability to verify the feasibility of a quoted flight in next to no time, by using the feasibility check feature.

With over 20 feasibility checks running in the background and appropriate data input, this is one of more reliable methods of optimising the workflow of your sales department. The tedious, time-consuming everyday chores have been replaced with automated validations, helping to monitor possible operational issues within the current quotation. What makes it even better is the fact that we are still adding new validation items on a regular basis.

Automatic feasibility checks have been divided into 3 categories, differentiated by the weight of potential discrepancies. Validations of the highest significance, such as overlapping flights or FTL violations, have been put into “Warnings” category. “Cautions” group consists of yellow traffic light-type suggestions, including potentially crucial information about airport categories, missing crew or quoted aircraft’s hold item list restrictions. Finally, the last category “Notices” contains information that may (or may not) affect the itinerary, such as ADES and ADEP notes.

Speeding up the quotation process

In this article we have gone through the list of the handiest validations that remove a lot of legwork from the quotation process and selected a few of them for you. Please bear in mind that for correct application of those rules and validations you should have appropriate operational data defined and available in Leon.

Airport checks – you will be first to know if any of airports included in the itinerary requires specific crew and pilot trainings, depending on its category. Apart from the airport categories data, Leon also checks opening hours of the particular airport and verifies requirements in terms of airport recency and airport briefing.

Overlapping flights – nobody wants to have his quoted leg overlapping with other booked flight in the schedule. We take care of that, providing you with a prompt heads-up.

FTLs – managing Flight Time Limitations is such a huge time investment that having a complete dedicated tool for this purpose changes everything. Feasibility check validates if a maximum FDP length has been exceeded on a single duty, alongside with rest periods and maximum flying times, with a distinction if a crew member is close to the limit (displayed as a caution) or has already exceeded it (displayed as a warning).

Crew availability – Leon can verify if on the day of the flight no minimum crew have been assigned with the duty on the aircraft.

Aircraft availability – there is a large number of feasibility checks associated with quoted aircraft. You want to know if aircraft’s documentation is missing, has expired or if there are any open HILs for this machine in the MX module. Leon will display a CAMO limit warning should aircraft be closing on the CAMO limits or has already exceeded them. If aircraft’s maximum range is shorter than distance on the particular leg in the itinerary, you will also be notified. Finally, a warning will be displayed if airport's runway length is shorter than aircraft's minimum runway length required.

More improvements coming soon

While we believe that Leon is a great charter sales solution already, our work is never over. Apart from additional feasibility validations on the horizon, Leon Sales is constantly being enhanced with new features such as Fuel Stop option or automatic calculation of PAX taxes for major flight destinations. By adding an invoice sending feature we have also started the development process for an automated generation of payment documents. Stay tuned for more announcements in the near future!

Do you think that the current list of feasibility checks is missing something? Let us know by contacting our Support or by visiting the Community site, where suggestions from the community are discussed directly with developers.

And if you are still on the fence on whether or not Leon is the right choice for you, maybe a 30 day free trial will push the needle forward? Our Sales team is happy to help!