Any JETSTAR News ??

[Dentist]

It seems that Jetstar is getting ready to do some interviews shortly? Can anyone give me any Idea on the number of Pilots required and if you will have to pay for the A320 ends, how much is it likely to be? Any news is greatly appreciated.
Many thanks
Dentist

[intake]

I'm like many who had the standard update email from Jet*. I'm interested how many of you said "yes" to - Are you prepared to pay for your A320 type rating. Be honest with us. I said No. For those who said Yes, have a F***en good look at yourself.

[Capt Fathom]

I like that intake.
Why don't we all apply to Jetstar and tick the NO box! :E

[MAX]

I ticked 'NO'. In low cost operator terms that will possibly mean 'No job'. You should see them lining up in Europe to pay for a job. Frightening.

MAX:cool:

[hoss]

Well I ticked YES, the way I see it is a good return for my dollar as employment there will mean a payrise. A FO(A320) position there would be similar to a command in the QF Regional I'm with now.

I have no problems in my mind with this and I've always liked the idea of trying an Airbus.

Money is ready to spend, hoss:)

ps. never paid for an endorsement as a Professional Pilot.
pps. had a good look in the mirror, no problems but might change barbers;) .

[Icarus2001]

So what would an A320 endorsement cost? Maybe $20-25,000. Amortise that over even a five year period. That makes $5000 per annum or around $96 per week!

Now if you can claim the tax deduction it would be an awful lot less.:O

So why wouldn't you pay for an endorsement to get the job? You paid for your CPL your CIR etc?

You can't stop progress...:rolleyes:

[Sonny Hammond]

And we wonder why we keep getting screwed?

Just keep getting the pointy end of the pineapple you lot, management love your roll over and take it mentality.

Pay for your endorsement? Mate, that is a cost of running an airline, and if you pay for it, that manager just got a $25000 odd bonus...

Merry Christmas on the Maldives for his family eh?

[Capt Snooze]

'You can't stop progress...'

Whilst agreeing that paying for, or being heavily bonded for a type rating is now common, and that it may become more common in the short-term future, I would hesitate to call it 'progress'.

(Yes, I saw the smiley)

Snooze :rolleyes:

[Icarus2001]

Sonny & Capt Snooze I think paying for ones own endorsement sucks but that is increasingly becoming the norm. I also think paying for a uni degree via HECS sucks also. I preferred the previous system where it was a community responsibility to make education available for our children.

Did anyone see the doco on the ABC on Monday night about the lawyers working in a legal aid agency. The boss made an interesting point. When studying law at uni was "free" graduates sometimes felt a moral responsibility to do pro bono work, in other words to put something back in to the system that trained them for "free". The situation now means it is everyman for him or herself to land the highest paying corporate law job.

Now back to flying. Put your own thoughts about paying for an endorsement to one side and apply the logic. You paid for your CPL and CIR and possibly FIR so why not an endorsement? Why draw a distinction? A RAAF pilot might well say " Pay for a licence, are you mad?" It all comes down to your perspective. I cannot see taking the moral high ground and refusing to pay as an option many young pilots earning $25,000 pa (if they are lucky) would consider preferable to biting the bullet pay the money and move up to a better job.

Yes it is despicable. So is the US system of healthcare where the ambulance will not pick you up without private insurance etc. BUT IT IS REALITY. Faced with a choice most pilots would take it. How is it different to the bonded SIA pilots? Their bond increases everytime they get a new endorsement I believe. Go figure.

[Lodown]

Depending on the terms, pay for the endorsement, but look at the job like any other. If there is a better opportunity down the track from another company, move on. Once you have an endorsement and a few hours, the opportunities around the world get very broad.

(If I was a cadet or a young pilot in Qantas, I'd be worried about what this meant for me and my career.)

[turbinejunkie]

Paying for your own jet endorsement? :hmm:

Have done enough of that in bug-smasher land. :*

Have no problem with being bonded for a period of time to get jet work :) but would resist the idea of paying for the priviledge. :suspect:

Hope circumstances won't put me in that position when the time comes ....... :eek:

TJ :ugh:

[tobzalp]

Now I am no pilot but I ask how is paying for an endorsement different from a computer programmer doing a MCSE course or learning a new computer language through a private firm? I guess the obvious difference is that airlines actually have the simulators at hand unlike a computing company who needs code now! (this is not a troll)

[turbinejunkie]

Tobzalp,

I appreciate your candid and frank disclosure of what is NOT your profession:
Now I am no pilot
In answer to your question:
but I ask how is paying for an endorsement different from a computer programmer doing a MCSE course or learning a new computer language through a private firm?
I have (and most likely most other readers here) have absolutely no idea about what an MSCE course is, but in as far as it goes in GA, and now increasingly in the airlines, costs are very high for a pilot to get a start.

I estimate (conservatively) I have spent over $25K for my CPL with another $30K with instrument ratings, endorsements, ATPL theory and building up my hours to be able to get a look-in at a basic single engine job and 14K salary in the first year I flew commercially. That was 5 years ago.

Since then, my salary has increased to the grand total of $34K after climbing to the lofty heights of turbine IFR multi-crew operations. Wow! Some return.

It gets even worse if you look at lost earnings in long periods of unemployment between jobs and inability to afford a home, etc. and get in on the boom in real estate and the share market in recent years that most other professions have been able benefit from (such as your IT pro) as one lives on a shoestring to make ends meet, renting ones way around the country.

Adding insult to injury, your average pilot commonly has to endure characters the likes of NAC's MD High Altitude: face "sub-contractor" status and get sweat-shop remuneration for professional work and given the "Take it or leave it option", pilots invariably take it.

Limited opportunities, high expenses, a highly competitive field in a small industry where costs are high, rewards low, causes pilots to climb over each other in an effort to stay afloat.

Now, when you factor in likely additional expenses of around $25k for a 737NG endorsement (VB) or A320 (J*) - which although one can claim a reasonable amount back through the tax system if done smartly or allowances can pay off a portion of the endorsement in a couple of years (VB) - with basic salaries in Regionals varying from approximately mid-low $30K (O'Connors) to low $60K (Skywest) at the high end (and the others fitting in between but generally $30'sK to $40'sK), it will take some time to recoup my investment in real terms, if ever.

I am tipping that your MSCE course doesn't cost anywhere near the above, and what's more, your average IT professional will almost certainly walk into $35K plus as a new graduate.

This may sound like a wingeing session and it probably is, but I tell you, miles of difference exists between the GA pilot and the IT professional implicit in your thread.

Perhaps we pilots (or I) are just mugs (a mug). Gotta love the office we (I) have though!

Respectfully yours,

TJ :ok:

[Dehavillanddriver]

TJ what you are NOT factoring in is the relative wages.

YOU pay for your endorsement in one form or another whether you join QF or VB.

With VB its blatant - you fork out the dough up front - you take the risk, but you go on full F/O pay from the day you check out in the simulator.

With QF they pay for the simulator and ground school, BUT they pay you a training wage until you are checked to line, and then pay you a reduced rate for the next 2 years - I stand to be corrected on the time frames...BUT they take the initial risk.

Either way - whether it be upfront, or effectively through payroll deduction you the new pilot pays for it - there are no free lunches any more unfortunately.

The QF way tends to engender more loyalty,the VB way tends to leave you with the feeling that you can go at any time if a better offer comes along.

Whilst the market is a bit quiet it makes no difference, the test will be when the market picks up, and it will, and people take their couple of thousand hours and head off from VB for a better job.

In either case case you get a good job that pays reasonably well and you get to fly good machines.

Don't make a "principled" stand unless you understand the choices that you are making - if VB (or J*) is the only job on offer to say I won't pay for the endorsement is cutting off your nose to spite your face in my opinion.

[hoss]

Anyone heard anything about when 'general' Pilot recruitment is due to start. I know of a few ex AN guys with type experience over there already.

Any info greatly appreciated :)

[newbe200]

I wonder how many of the anti-pay endorsement guys actually already have or are not interested in an airline job....

10 years ago, you would have never paid for anything, but now, you pay for everything so tough luck.

Everyone seems to get the sh1ts with the whole thing but nobody is prepared to do anything about it.

Intake, sonny hammond and turbine junkie,

what are you guys doing to stop the crap in GA and Airlines. Nothing, Nothing, Nothing. And why?? Because you and I have been bent over the barrel and there is nothing you can do about it. your employer knows it, you know it. you can do something, but hey, 1989....

So everybody has to be one, but that aint going to happen because there are so many bloody mummy's boys living with there parents, doing it all for free. Game set match, rich kids!

Most chose this career, some had theirs chosen by daddy but, and that is where the problems start.

[intake]

newbe200, who the f*** do you think you are! I would greatly appreciate you not assuming what I will or will not do. And for your information I have never let anyone bend me over in this industry. Yes I do fly a narrow body and would love to return to Oz but not buying my way in. I can accept a training bond ( sign for time). Think about what you write next time...:ok:

[Icarus2001]

10 years ago, you would have never paid for anything, but now, you pay for everything so tough luck.
Here is part of the problem. Perceptions like this. Read DehavillandDrivers post above. He has hit the nail on the head. Relative starting wages etc. You paid for your PPL, you paid for your CPL you paid for your CIR and you paid for your FIR. Paying for all this without the guarantee of work. Why is it such anathema to pay for an aircraft endorsement when you know you will get a job out of it?

Look to other areas of the workforce. Should we tell all university students to stop paying their HECS bills because ten years ago university was "free"?

As I said before I do not like the way things have gone but I am intelligent enough to know that my opinion does not matter.:confused: It is simply economic rationalism. Live with it and progress through the "system" or get out.

Worry about the things you can change, don't worry about those that you cannot change and hope like hell that you can tell the difference!

[newbe200]

You are kidding yourself. You say you wont pay for an endorsement to come home. What crap!!

And what exactly is the difference in a training bond or paying straight up mate. Nothing! You pay straight up you get it back over the next few years (DJ anyway), you bond - you leave - you pay, same thing. After two or three years your in the same financial position.

Calm down and get back to your 'narrow body' MR. Important. oooh, hey everyone, I fly a J E T.:cool:

And i do think about what i write, except i really dont need to be as forceful with the big swear words, as you do. Are you short??

[intake]

Well newbe200, you sound like one of the many that brought your job at DJ. In regards to "you get it back in the next few years", I understand that it's a retention bonus that DJ pays- not here's your refund on your endorsement. Two different things. Anyway enough of this - sleep well night:ok:

[newbe200]

ah, no actually, not at virgin. not even in a jet. poor me.:sad:

[turbinejunkie]

newbe

What a surprising outburst!

Your misinformed assumptions about me are completely wrong and quite illogical if I may say so.

Why would someone discuss shoestring budgets to live on, that they had paid for their quals, etc. and mention a modest salary if they were a "rich kid / mummys boy / whatever"?

I submit you wouldn't have the foggiest damn idea what I am doing about anything and for the record, I AM doing something, HERE: persuading, arguing, debating, discussing, talking about conditions on a F O R U M - that's what this is - a place where people d i s c u s s things.:8

As a matter of fact, I do discuss matters of my employment with my employer, with my colleagues and are a member of the Federation.

You know, I find it funny how most things can often be sorted out by reasonable discussion and behaviour but most people don't seem to have the guts to bring these sorts of things out in the open with their bosses or with others.

newbe, we are not powerless automaton slaves who have no choice in life but to take it or leave it. NO! We DO have a choice in life and it seems to me, that if more people were prepared to say to a boss pushing some dodgy arrangement "Is that your offer? Are you kidding? Shove it up your clacker!!" that conditions would improve generally. It may take a bit of time but eventually the wheel would turn and the industry would improve.

No! It is ONLY an employers market because people ALLOW themselves to be bent over and poked! If you don't accept a dirty deal, you keep your dignity and eventually will find a better offer.

Pilots in my view are their own worst enemies. Climbing over the guy next to you might get you the job by accepting some sham employment basis but one day (if you luck out on the airlines or whatever), you might find yourself stuck in a cesspool that you may begin to wish that a few less people were willing to take peanuts and a few more stand up for their rights and the interests of their fellow man.

I'd love to be in a jet-job. But it should be clear from my post that I wouldn't want to pay for one. Why? Number 1, because I don't have the finance to do so. Add to that, I think it is an employer's responsibility.

DehavillandDriver may be right about cutting off one's nose to spite their own face but that really is just a sad reflection of what we collectively have allowed ourselves to accept.

As I mentioned previously, I have no problem with being bonded or on a training salary for a period of time to return to an employer his investment in me, but I personally do not agree at all with the concept of "pay-me-for-your-job". :*

Sure, you can take VB for a while then run off with your 1 or 2000 hours on a 737 to Cathay. But what will you do if Cathay starts to take the GA way? Its already happened in Qantas with Jetstar but not with Eastern.

Why? Because on the one hand some are quite happy to accept a poor offer at the expense of others. On the other hand, others are willing to stand up for their rights and preserve their reasonable conditions by negotiating a solid EBA.

Employers love the divide and conquer tactic because once they get an inch, a mile is inevitably taken.

Today the economy is travelling well. The business cycle is buoyant. Jobs are plentiful (by aviation's standards anyway). Why are we settling for peanuts?

Fear. Fear that we'll miss out and someone else will get it instead. My question is, if the deal is dodgy, why are we worried about that to begin with?

How long does one prostitute themselves for before enough is enough? :mad:

TJ :ouch: