In House pilots

Originally posted by wysiwyg
Thanks WD. In the UK and Europe all Captains and FOs must be type rated.

In the US, if an FO is not type rated what training will they have taken that is type specific (ground and sim) before commencing line training?

The training is the same minus one or 2 elements. The only difference for the captain type ride and first officer checkride for the EMB-145 is the captain has to demonstrate a no-flap landing in the sim. Not much of a difference. Also because it’s not a type ride, some forgiveness can be given if the FO messes up a manuever during the ride.

Why not type the First Officers? Beats me. I guess it doesn’t really matter. I won’t lose sleep over it.

well i supose cashflow could be a problem yes.

Thanks WD. In the UK and Europe all Captains and FOs must be type rated.

In the US, if an FO is not type rated what training will they have taken that is type specific (ground and sim) before commencing line training?

Yes, the only airline (big or small) that requires a type rating to be hired as an FO is Southwest. Once hired a number of airlines type the First Officers due to operational requirements. Continental I know types all their FO’s in the 737 when they go through training due to the trip lengths they fly with the 737-800/900’s.

Smaller airlines only require a multi-engine commercial certificate and will give you both your ATP and type rating at the same time when you upgrade to captain.

Excellent and accurate post, WD.

Is it still possible to be an FO in the US withour a type rating then?

Originally posted by skycruiser

Interesting point.

In the UK the LLC such as Ryanair are charging 50 pounds to read your CV and then 150 pounds for an interview. They then charge you for a sim ride, uniform, type rating and even on board drinks. Easyjet has a lot of hidden charges as well. Quite a lot of guys I know who have gone there a spending a fortune to work for these companies.:mad:

The industry is a changing place, that’s for sure.;)

Ah, Pay For Training (PFT) is quite a heated topic here in the US. It was quite common among “entry level” airline jobs. Sure a company might be hiring but they expect the new pilot to foot the bill. In addition to paying for your training in what ever aircraft they hire you into ($7500-$12,000) you won’t get paid by the company while in training (even per diem)and you’ll have to pay for your own logging. You won’t come away with a type rating either, just enough training to make you an able body First Officer. You can also fail and go home with no return on your investment. After all that if you pass, you’ll come away with a job that pays you a little more than your training cost per year ($18,000 per year).

Once the big hiring boom of 1999-2000 got started all airlines that had PFT dropped it to draw in the required new pilots each year. Now that the industry hiring has slowed again, it’s starting back up again. Southwest is the only major that has any sort of PFT in that they require you to have a 737 type before you get hired. They will hire you before you have a 737 type but will require you to have it within a few months. Now this isn’t a pure PFT operation as you come away with a 737 type rating and that can open up doors at other airlines. We’re asking for a no-PFT clause in our new contract. Last thing any of us want to see is the return of that ugly beast.

Pilots are their own worse enemies when it comes to salaries and work rules. It only takes one pilot to say he’ll do it for less and he drags down every other pilot’s career possibilities with him.

We’re seeing it all the time here. A major airline goes to it’s feeder airlines and waves new 50-70 seat jets in front of the pilot group. Either those pilots work for less than their competitors or the major airline will take those jets to someone who will. So someone is going to get the jets and fly them for $xx/hour so why not have it be you?? If the pilot groups were strong and everyone turned it down then the major airlines couldn’t get away with such demands. There is one small regional airline that flies Dash-8’s and basically told their parent company US Airways to screw themselves when they came making 50 seat jet demands. Now the leases are up on the Dash-8’s sending them back to the company and they aren’t getting any airplanes to replace them. No airplanes = No airline. The pilots made a strong stand and put themselves right out of a job. Did they do the right thing? Well, they stood fast by their believe that they deserved not only liveable wages but an industry standard for the type of operation they were to run. But, by doing so US Airways took those jets to someone who would work for less.

Originally posted by brenmcc1
As long as i’m flying im happy

Flying doesn’t make one happy very long when you’re making less than the guys loading the bags into the cargo bin. It’s imperative that pilots demand to be paid according to the work they do, not by how much the love their job. No one ever saw a doctor admitting that he’d work for less than half of his equally qualified partner just so he could be hired at the local hospital.

Originally posted by brenmcc1
As long as i’m flying im happy

I guarantee you that after 6 months as a professional that view would no longer be enough!

All the low cost airlines I can think of are very ungenerous (is that a real word?) with their benefits package. At Thomas Cook I am provided with private medical cover for myself whereas Virgin will provide private medical for me my wife and my kids. This will save me several hundred pounds a year and is equivalent to having earned a higher salary. When you consider all the other benefits (loss of license insurance, paid for medicals, pension, PHI cover, etc, etc) it really does add up to rather a lot of hidden salary that the low costs often lose out on.