B737 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP); Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Multiengine
Communication Breakdown; Troubleshooting
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural MEL / CDL; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
General Maintenance Action
Human Factors; Company Policy; MEL; Procedure
Upon reaching the aircraft the FO (First Officer) informed me that the FMC database was out of date; having expired the night before. I informed her to call Maintenance; she called them 45 minutes prior to departure. The technician arrived at the aircraft with quite an attitude; saying can you look at the MEL (no please or pleasantries). The first thing in the MEL in bold is 'with Captain's concurrence' using special procedures. I assumed that they wanted my concurrence before they started the MEL. I told the FO to open the QRH and see if this was addressed in the emergency manual; it is. The FO was not comfortable with this. We are flying over water; we do not have enough fuel to fly over land and most of our route is based on computer navigation. I am not familiar with the 'alternate procedures' so I call Maintenance Control. First I ask them why the database was not updated. It changes on a regular schedule. He says 'I don't know?' I tell him that I want it updated. ZZZ is a company maintenance base. I think I would lose my license if anything went wrong and I had chosen to depart with an aircraft that left a maintenance base without scheduled maintenance being done on the navigation computer; particularly when it says in bold 'with Captain's concurrence' which I read as extra onus on me. The mechanic returned and told me he had been ordered to MEL the item; what do I want him to do. I told him I was not going to take the aircraft; but he is free to follow his orders. He left; returned 30 minutes later and put stickers on the FMC saying INOP; 'data base out of date'. He handed me the logbook and said; it is good to go; can I do anything else for you? I replied 'you can fix the aircraft'. He replied 'good day' and left.  I called Dispatch and asked them what they want to do. He said it is not in his authority. I asked him to call Maintenance Control and tell them I want the aircraft fixed like I told them 45 minutes ago. The mechanics returned to update the database. It took 1 hour. We departed about 15 minutes later as we had to reload everything. If Maintenance had started updating it when we first called; we would have been about 10-15 minutes late in ZZZ1 and all the passengers would have made their connections. A Captain can refuse any MEL item; but very few have the words 'with Captain's concurrence' written in bold print at the beginning of the MEL. The sentence told me that there are special considerations and none of this had been planned for or addressed. For Maintenance to try to pressure me into taking this; particularly since it is scheduled maintenance that they know about as soon as they put the previous database in is unconscionable. I was so upset at Maintenance's attitude and attempt to pressure me to take an aircraft that I was going to file an ASAP report. I decided against it because I thought this was just a case of a few bad apples. 5 minutes after arriving home I received a call from a chief pilot; saying that Maintenance had filed a report on me! It is obvious the words 'with Captain's concurrence' does not mean anything to our Maintenance. [I] suggest doing the scheduled maintenance on the aircraft. If the Captain says they are not going to take the MEL; find another solution and don't try to pressure the Captain.
B-737 Captain reported difficulty getting assigned aircraft's FMS database updated.