Question about landing speed

[Rene Feijen]

A friend on mine (living in another country) practical always has autothrottle kicking in in the approach phase. I suspect his speeds are outside limits for normal (auto)land. Now I dont have this problem. Am I right to think that I first have to select a stage of flaps, thus allowing AT in PROF mode to let the speed go down, do a next stage of flaps, etc. And not the other way around: waiting for the speed to come down (which I would say will not happen in PROF mode but in some manual speed mode), and only then selecting flaps?

Is somewhere in an SOP or FCOM described what to do in what order?

[Crabby]

You need to have the approach phase filled out (selection of flaps and MDA).  You also need to activate the approach phase by hitting the bottom right button on that page.  I do it between 30 and 20 miles out from the airport.  If you are autothrottle after that, you would extend slats at the S on the speed tape, then flaps.  The autot throttle should adjust the speed accordingly.  All of this is from memory because I am traveling and I don't fly the aircraft on auto pilot/throttle below 10K as I like to fly it.  The only exception to that rule would be if I am anticipating a true need to auto land (weather).  

[Rene Feijen]

Aha... activating the approach phase on the FMCG. Never done that before. Cant remember seeing youtubers doing that but maybe overlooked? Will try.

[Deleted Account]

The plane will also automatically activate the approach mode once all necessary steps are taken as well. If there are speed restrictions on the descent the plane will also follow those and reduce speed as necessary.