Flight Revenue and Billing

Atom™ provides proven flight revenue and billing systems that draw on operational flight data and databases of airline and aircraft information to accurately and completely bill for use of the airspace and the airport. Atom™ has advanced functions for overflight and airport billing both on a periodic and real-time basis.

Overflight revenue

The Atom™ overflight revenue functions have been used successfully for many years. By using the same flight information that air traffic control uses, overflight billing is straightforward, transparent and requires no additional controller workload. The flight plan information in the Atom™ database is used to automatically determine information including the airline, the operator, the registration, type of aircraft, its weight and the distance flown through the airspace. Distance flown through special billing airspaces or other parameters can be used to add or subtract distance and airspace entry fees at different rates, even for a single flight. Atom™ can record all this information to the level of an individual flight for auditing and verification purposes.

Overflight real-time billing

Unlike CAAs, airports benefit from the fact that the aircraft and crew is physically present at the airport, unless the flight has an account with the airport, the fee is typically paid just before departing. While billing of overflight charges for IATA/ICAO airlines by CAAs can be simple and reliable, some flights, especially general aviation, can be very difficult to collect because of their itinerant nature and that many of the aircraft may be registered in States different than that of the CAA. Atom™ can assist with this sometimes nearly-impossible task by allowing the CAA to forge mutually beneficial relationships with “Cooperating Airports” to collect these often lost fees. When the CAA’s Atom™ billing system determines that a flight is inbound to a Cooperating Airport, and cannot be billed directly by the CAA, just before landing, it can calculate the en route fees and automatically send a text message to the Cooperating Airport, so that the en route overflight fees due to the CAA can be added to the airport’s landing and parking fees.

Of course, this capability works best when both the CAA and the Cooperating Airport use Atom™ systems, but it can also work for both if either one has the Atom™ system.

In an alternate manner, the Cooperating Airport’s Atom™ system can use the CAA’s overflight billing rules independently and dynamically to calculate the same overflight billing information from the current inbound and outbound departure flight plans, and collect those amounts directly from the pilot. The Airport’s Atom™ system simply uses the current arrival and departure flight plans for both its Airport and CAA fee calculations. By automatically exchanging the most recent and updated flight information between the CAA and the Airport, both the Air Traffic and financial operations of both can benefit. In this mode, the CAA’s Atom™ revenue system or other system calculates and keeps track of fees to be collected for it by the Cooperating Airports, even as a monthly report, since it also has the arrival and departure flight information.

Airport Revenue

By using the air traffic control information available at the airport, the Atom™ system automatically matches a flight’s arrival and departure flight plan data to determine many billing and statistical parameters such as time on the ground, registration, aircraft type and weight, airline and/or operator. This information can be updated by the Tower with such information as actual arrival and departure times and registration information. Atom™ allows for the entry of manifest information such as passenger and cargo counts at the AIS, billing or airline office. This information can be used in the statistics and billing reports.

Atom™ will also track the airlines and individual aircraft that have accounts with the airport so they will not be demand-billed.

Airport Real-time billing

Airports often need to know on a dynamic basis which aircraft need to pay before departing. In the database of airlines, Atom™ maintains information of what airlines and individual aircraft have monthly billing accounts with the airport, so it is readily apparent on all needed displays, such as the AIS, Tower and billing office, which aircraft should pay before departing. Using the flight information and any other entered manifest information, the Atom™ Reporting and Billing System (RBS) will produce on-demand “immediate” bills for those flights that must pay before departure.

Export of flight information

The airport statistical and billing information gathered in Atom™ can be exported directly to the Atom™ RBS, printed out or it can be exported to MS Excel or other systems.