How To Make A Lot Of Points

[pegase]

Passengers57 method looks nice but... a bit boring. Here, thanks to FSNavigator, I have an estimated time. While cruising I try to adjust FSNavigator
estimation arrival time 10-15 minutes before planned arrival time. Off course assuming I won't have to go around...

Hhandle with care, yesterday I pushed to 320 kts due to stronger face winds than expected (around 90 kts) but a windshear in full face sent me beyond
Vne for some second. DING !!! -600 pts !

Or, you could just arrive early as we try to do in reality. I was talking to Dan some time back about implementing a feature that would
provide for a bonus if arriving early (up to a limit, say 10-30 minutes)

why not ?
Now I am curious how time assignment is done in real world ?

I have seen quite often that our take off where delayed because our DESTINATION airspace was expected to be overcrowded at planed arrival time
Also, arrival time is already printed on the schedule way before the Captain make his Flight planning So who forcasts the time to be in destinations
airspace ? Does the Captain confirm or not depending on conditions this scheduled time ?

[bdlong]

I had a flight this past week where things didn't work out so good.

I saw that I was arriving earlier than scheduled, so I decided to do a couple of circuits in the holding pattern. I had it timed pretty good, after
the second circuit, headed for the faf(final approach fix). Tower has cleared me for approach, I should touch down with 5 minutes left before my
planned arrival time. (I like landing with 3-6 minutes left, this gives me enough time to taxi without "speeding" to get to the gate). However, he
continues to clear planes for take-off. The closer I get, the more nervous I get - less than a mile, and he clears another one to take the active.
At a half mile, he has me go around. So much for all of my advance planning. What would have been an almost perfect arrival time is now
leading to penalized points for being too late. Fortunately, the weather was VFR. I started the missed approach procedures, cancelled IFR and flew a
close circuit to short final. Only arrived 9 minutes late - no bonus, but at least I wasn't penalized.

[jlc]

Maybe, to avoid the missed approach, you could do your holding pattern sooner, about 10 to 15 NM befor landing.
By this way, the tower will not still clear your approach (message usually about 4 NM from the runway).
And after your turns in the HP, you will come back to the straight approach, receive the clearance and land quietly in time...
I am not sure it works every time, but I think that to try a HP is more fair than to oblige the pax to wait on the runway.