"Do we count the atheists?" hahahaha excellent!
Well, I's talking about Europe, but it true at least in France and Belgium where I fly. yeah for a routine call-up, you've to say the number of poeple on board, but only during the initial contact, before having a beacon code. Then they know of you...
- "ATC Station xx, g'day, F-FGRH, is type Cessna 172, 4 persons on board, departing "city1", going to "city2", with you "feet" or flight level, overhead "report point"...
Then you're given an xpond code, then you're identified, then you say whatever is your request.
25 nm radius nav and longer require you to file a FPL. But for some reason, sometimes they're not aware of you.
But as I said, it depends on ATC officers.. some of them don't really care about pax on brd.
ATC in France is wayyyyyyyy different from the US/Can ATC... I just love the second one.
flaps