ATC IFR Cancellation Tricks

One thing that will earn you brownie points with Air Traffic Control is to cancel your IFR flight plan as soon as practical while still in the air -- assuming you can safely maintain VFR throughoout your flight including the landing. Remember, when you are on an IFR flight plan the controller has to allocate a specific amount of airspace around your aircraft. If you decend through the clouds and have the airport in sight you can cancel your IFR flight plan and proceed VFR. The controller will be happy because he can release that airspace to other traffic and make his job easier. Your job gets easier becouse you do not have to fly the STAR (Stadard Arrivial Proceedure) or shoot the approach. This makes everyones workload much easier -- Saves AvGas as well.