A320 captain reported communication breakdown between flight crew and deicing crew.

Attributes
ACN	1607749
Time
Date	201901
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	A320
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Parked
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Captain
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Multiengine
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 180 Flight Crew Total 3854 Flight Crew Type 2800
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Ground Event / Encounter Other / Unknown

Narrative:

We operated aircraft X from ZZZ to [destination.] after our initial cockpit set up my first officer went down to do the walk around. After he came up he told me that 'they are de-icing our wings and tail.' no communication had been established between us and the deicing team. We had no opportunity to configure for deicing. De-icing had commenced without our knowledge. I contacted de-icing control and requested to talk to a rep. A few minutes later I was talking to the team leader of the crew de-icing our jet. He said that they are now trained to go ahead and start the deicing procedure (at the gate) as long as ground power is plugged in and gate air is connected.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A320 Captain reported communication breakdown between flight crew and deicing crew.

Narrative: We operated Aircraft X from ZZZ to [destination.] After our initial cockpit set up my First Officer went down to do the walk around. After he came up he told me that 'they are de-icing our wings and tail.' No communication had been established between us and the deicing team. We had no opportunity to configure for deicing. De-icing had commenced without our knowledge. I contacted de-icing control and requested to talk to a rep. A few minutes later I was talking to the team leader of the crew de-icing our jet. He said that they are now trained to go ahead and start the deicing procedure (at the gate) as long as ground power is plugged in and gate air is connected.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.