Regulation

Regulation (EU) 2017/373 is not one rule. It is the layer ATS.OR.320 lives inside.

Most of what gets cited about ATC rostering is one article, ATS.OR.320. This page is about the regulation it lives inside: what sits above it, what sits beside it, and what a UK ANSP reads instead.

The instrument

Reference: Regulation (EU) 2017/373
Also known as: The ATM/ANS Implementing Rule
Adopted: March 2017
Applied from: January 2020
Rostering annex: Annex IV, Part-ATS
Predecessor: Regulation (EC) No 216/2008

Regulation (EU) 2017/373 lays down common requirements for providers of air traffic management and air navigation services (ATM/ANS) and other ATM network functions, and for their oversight. It is organised as a set of Annexes, each covering a category of provider or function under its own “Part”. This page, and the two article pages either side of it, describe only Part-ATS, the Annex covering providers of air traffic services, where rostering and fatigue live. The regulation covers other categories of provision under their own Parts; those are out of scope here.

The stack

Four layers, four different kinds of authority

01
Global standard
ICAO Annex 11, Chapter 2 §2.28
Requires States to establish fatigue-management regulations, either prescriptive scheduling limits (Appendix 6) or a Fatigue Risk Management System, or a mix of both.
Binding on ICAO Contracting States, not directly on an ANSP.
02
EU primary law
Regulation (EU) 2018/1139, Annex VIII
The “Basic Regulation”. Its essential requirements state that ATC service provision may not proceed unless fatigue is managed through a rostering system addressing duty periods, duty time and rest periods.
Directly binding EU law.
03
EU implementing rule
Regulation (EU) 2017/373, Annex IV, Part-ATS
ATS.OR.315 (the fatigue policy) and ATS.OR.320 (the eight-element rostering system), the two articles this pillar covers in depth.
Directly binding EU law.
04
Non-binding guidance
AMC1 ATS.OR.315(a), AMC1 ATS.OR.320(a)(6);(7)
Acceptable Means of Compliance: one way to comply, not the only one. The single number EASA supplies is the night-time window, 00:00–05:59.
Non-binding; an ANSP may propose an alternative means of compliance instead.

EUROCONTROL's practitioner guidelines, NMD/SAF/2653 and NMD/SAF/2611, sit alongside this stack rather than in it: they are neither law nor AMC, just documented practice an ANSP can draw on. See what they say, and what they do not, at /evidence/eurocontrol.

Layer 2, in full

The Basic Regulation's essential requirement, verbatim

This is the sentence everything else in this stack exists to satisfy. It names the rostering system before any implementing rule does.

“ATC service provision shall not be undertaken unless the following conditions are met: (a) the prevention of fatigue of personnel providing an ATC service shall be managed through a rostering system. Such a rostering system needs to address duty periods, duty time and adapted rest periods. Limitations established within the rostering system shall take into account relevant factors contributing to fatigue such as, in particular, sleep deprivation, disruption of circadian cycles, night hours, cumulative duty time for given periods of time and also the sharing of allocated tasks between personnel;”
Regulation (EU) 2018/1139, Annex VIII (Essential requirements for ATM/ANS and air traffic controllers), point 5.2(a)

Everything ATS.OR.320 specifies, the eight elements, the consultation duty, exists to make this one paragraph operational, and everything ATS.OR.315 requires exists to give it a named owner. Read both articles in full at /regulation/ats-or-320 and/regulation/ats-or-315.

The other EU regulation

2017/373 regulates the organisation. 2015/340 regulates the licence.

These are two different regulations, about two different things, and they only touch at one point: training content.

Regulation (EU) 2017/373

The ANSP's obligations

Applies to the air traffic control service provider as an organisation: it must run a fatigue policy (ATS.OR.315) and a rostering system with eight specified elements (ATS.OR.320). Adopted March 2017, applied from January 2020.

Regulation (EU) 2015/340

The controller's licence

Lays down technical requirements and administrative procedures for ATCO licences and certificates. Adopted 20 February 2015, theoretically applicable from 30 June 2015 but actually implemented by EU ATSPs from 2017. It requires that fatigue prevention be included as a subtopic in the human-factors training programme, at Sections 3 and 4 of Subpart D of Annex I.

The hand-off is explicit in the text: ATS.OR.315(b) requires ATCO fatigue information programmes “complementing human factors training provided in accordance with Sections 3 and 4 of Subpart D of Annex I to Regulation (EU) 2015/340.” One regulation trains the person; the other regulates the organisation that rosters them. Full treatment of the policy article at /regulation/ats-or-315.

The global floor

What ICAO requires, and which branch the EU took

Regulation (EU) 2017/373 did not invent the fatigue-rostering requirement. It implements a choice ICAO leaves to each State.

“2.28.1 States shall establish regulations for the purpose of managing fatigue in the provision of air traffic control services. These regulations shall be based upon scientific principles and knowledge, with the aim of ensuring that air traffic controllers perform at an adequate level of alertness. To that aim, States shall establish: a) regulations that prescribe scheduling limits in accordance with Appendix 6; and b) where authorizing air traffic services providers to use a fatigue risk management system (FRMS) to manage fatigue, FRMS regulations in accordance with Appendix 7.”
ICAO Annex 11, Chapter 2, §2.28.1

As written, ATS.OR.320 follows the prescriptive branch: it requires the ANSP to define its own numeric limits for eight elements, and contains no FRMS opt-in mechanism comparable to Annex 11's Appendix 7 route. The UK CAA states this outright for the UK specifically: “At present, the UK has not authorised air traffic services providers to use a FRMS.”

UK CAA, Safety and Airspace Regulation Group, CAA Policy on Air Traffic Controllers' Rostering System(s), Policy Statement, 2 September 2021, para. 1.4

Where the UK diverges

Retained law, and a CAA that has already amended it

Regulation (EU) 2017/373 was retained in UK domestic law under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, cited as the ATM/ANS Implementing Rule. The obligation in ATS.OR.320(a) still applies. What has diverged is the guidance underneath it.

On 31 December 2020 the CAA adopted EASA's AMC and GM as UK policy, but it can amend them, and has. The UK's AMC and GM now use the values from the pre-existing Scheme for the Regulation of Air Traffic Controllers' Hours (SRATCOH, from 1992) as their foundation, supplementing and in one case replacing EASA's material. An ATC service provider using the UK values is not expected to justify them separately; one using different values may propose an alternative means of compliance for the CAA to approve.

Reading this if you operate in the UK

Same article, same eight elements, same consultation duty.
Different default AMC/GM, SRATCOH-derived, not EASA's.
Short-notice modifications are reportable: form SRG 1410 within 24 hours.
No FRMS route authorised, so the prescriptive path is the only path.

UK CAA, Safety and Airspace Regulation Group, Policy Statement, 2 September 2021

Read the articles

The two articles this regulation is known for

ATS.OR.320

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Regulation (EU) 2017/373 is not one rule. It is the layer ATS.OR.320 lives inside.

Four layers, four different kinds of authority

ICAO Annex 11, Chapter 2 §2.28

Regulation (EU) 2018/1139, Annex VIII

Regulation (EU) 2017/373, Annex IV, Part-ATS

AMC1 ATS.OR.315(a), AMC1 ATS.OR.320(a)(6);(7)