Volume 61 | Thursday, January 19, 2023

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An Introduction to FOS Tech Support

Welcome back to Jump Seat. This week, we want to introduce you to the FOS® Customer Support Team. This team is comprised of FOS subject matter experts with backgrounds in flight operations, scheduling, IT, and more. The team wears many hats providing technical support, training, and report writing expertise for our FOS customers.  

In 2011, CTA FOS became a part of the portfolio. FOS, or Flight Operations System, was a home-grown scheduling software with a large customer base and small support team. Today the support team has grown globally to support our international customer base with team members in the US, Europe, and Asia. The team consists of a variety of backgrounds and expertise with some former users of FOS, aviation, and IT professionals. 


FOS is a vast program with functionality to support many different types of operations around the world. Having a team with diverse experiences allows them to collaborate and find the best solution to our customers’ questions. The team is equipped to answer a wide range of questions from routine to complex functionality within the application. In addition to on demand support by phone and email, the team also maintains a vast help guide repository that is available to all FOS customers here. There you’ll find help articles for modules within the application, recorded webinars, general updates, and more. 


Not only does the FOS technical support team provide the highest level of customer service but they also offer training and consultation services as well as report writing.  

 

Training and Consultation


The team provides both web and onsite training to customers, both new and existing, to provide tailored implementation and training services to ensure customer success. We also provide consultation services that take a deeper look at existing processes within the application to optimize operations. Our trainers have experience working with customers globally and are familiar with a wide variety of operations. For more information about training offerings reach out to the FOS Technical Support team.  


Report Writing


FOS comes standard with hundreds of reports, but there may be a need to modify a report format or include additional data on an existing report. Our report writing team specializes in creating customized reports and modifying existing reports to suit our customers’ FOS reporting needs. Their expertise includes knowledge of the FOS database structures, complex formula writing in Crystal Reports Designer, and flight operations knowledge that helps customers get the most out of their data. They can assist with anything from the design of a custom quote to business intelligence reporting.  


Meet the Team

Meet Sarah Szyszkiewicz


Sarah Szyszkiewicz joined the FOS team in October of 2014. She has decades of experience working in the aviation industry for airlines and business aviation operators. Sarah’s outgoing personality and approach to customer service instills confidence in our customers. As a trainer, Sarah combines her vast industry and FOS knowledge with top tier customer support to enable customer success.


You can call the FOS Technical Support team at +1 434-422-3933 or toll free at 1-800-610-0809 or send an email to FOSSupport@collins.com.


Additionally, Sarah and others from the team plan to be at Booth 1245 at the NBAA Schedulers and Dispatchers Conference from January 24-26 in Nashville, TN. 

Did you know?

  • FOS was originally developed in 1983 as a DOS-based program. It was rewritten in the 90’s for Windows and has evolved with the industry over the decades. The program features unique business aviation specific data points not available in many competitor products. It also integrates with many of the industry’s leading software tools making it an indispensable platform for any flight operation. For these reasons and more, FOS remains the industry standard for scheduling software.  



  • A Next Generation solution is in works that will eventually replace today’s FOS system. Using the Agile design and development philosophy, we have successfully released Calendar Exchange, the first of a suite of apps that will seamlessly work together to comprise a full scheduling solution. Coming very soon is our next significant development release which will add a more traditional Timeline view to Calendar Exchange that will provide schedulers and dispatchers the ultimate situational awareness of their operation. Also, in the late stages of development, and to be ready shortly after the Timeline view, is our FOSSYNC project which will link an operator’s current production FOS system with Calendar Exchange and the rest of our NextGen apps. We are excited to have made these initial steps towards a comprehensive NextGen scheduling solution and invite you to ask us more about these apps and our development roadmap. 

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