The end users of the steel plate are demanding better quality in terms of surface cleanliness and flatness.In the current competitive market,the knowledge and understanding of the complete process route is vital for plate producers to deal with surface and flatness issues.During all operations of plate production,the hot steel surface is exposed to air with which it reacts to form an oxide surface layer(scale).This paper describes how the influence of the scale layer during production extends the entire production process,from the Reheat Furnace through Primary and Mill Descaling practices to Intensive Cooling and Hot Levelling and finally to the Cooling Bed.When rolling thin and wide plate,flatness becomes a major issue where the importance of close coupled process control in the Plate Mill Line is illustrated.The paper highlights how the interaction of surface scale in post-rolling Intensive Cooling can lead to non-homogeneous surface heat transfer which may result in subsequent flatness issues.Finally the use of Levelling technology is briefly described which leads to the best flatness and minimum residual stress in the final product.