Vellox Group Ideas Portal
Build squawk tracking directly into the platform, attached to the aircraft. A squawk is a discrepancy report tied to a specific tail number that anyone flying that aircraft can file at any point, preflight, in cruise, post-flight, doesn't matter. It then flows to maintenance, gets worked, and gets signed off, with the full history living on the aircraft record.
Think of it as the digital version of the squawk sheet, but one that talks to dispatch, surfaces at preflight, and never gets thrown away.
Closes a real safety loop. Issues get captured the second a pilot notices them instead of being forgotten by landing.
Single source of truth per tail. Maintenance, dispatch, and the next pilot all see the same open list.
Compliance and defensibility. Timestamped, attributed, auditable record of every discrepancy and its resolution.
Natural fit for the iPad app. Pilots already have it in the cockpit, so reporting from where the issue is found is frictionless.
Differentiator. Ties maintenance status to dispatch and preflight in a way a standalone logbook can't.
1. Report a squawk from anywhere Quick-entry form a pilot can fire off in under 30 seconds. Optimized for the iPad app and the cockpit. Required fields kept minimal: aircraft (auto-filled if they're already in a flight/aircraft context), description, and a severity/airworthiness flag. Everything else optional so reporting never feels like a chore.
2. Attached to the aircraft Every squawk lives on the aircraft record by tail number. Each aircraft has an "Open Squawks" view and a full history. This is the spine of the whole feature.
3. Airworthiness / grounding flag Pilot marks whether the issue is grounding or non-grounding (and we can refine to a real status set later). This is the single most important field because it drives everything downstream.
4. Status workflow Simple lifecycle to start: Open, In Progress, Deferred, Closed. Maintenance moves it through, with a corrective-action note and who signed it off captured on close.
5. Photos and attachments Let pilots snap a photo of the issue and attach it. A picture of the actual chip detector or the cracked lens saves maintenance a phone call.
6. System / location categorization Tag the squawk by aircraft system (avionics, powerplant, airframe, etc.) and where on the aircraft. ATA chapter codes are the right long-term standard here, but a friendly dropdown gets us started.
7. Notifications and routing When a squawk is filed, the right people get pinged. Grounding squawks should hit maintenance / the DOM immediately, not sit in a queue. Routing rules can stay simple at launch.
8. Surfaces at preflight Open squawks for the tail show up when a pilot pulls up that aircraft to fly, alongside any existing MEL restrictions already on record. Nobody should be able to dispatch blind to what's open or what limitations are active (VFR only, etc.). Even a read-only "here's what's outstanding" panel covers the MVP.
9. Audit trail Who reported it, when, every status change, the corrective action, who closed it. Full immutable history on the aircraft record. This is the compliance backbone.
