Future career advice.

[Buzzy367]

Hi Guys and girls.

I'm looking for some advice from people in the know. I'm currently serving in the RAF as an Aircraft technician on mechanical systems. (Airframe, Powerplant etc) and have been in for 15 years. I only have 7 years to go until 22 years and pension where at this time I am concidering a flying career. I was wandering what the chances of employment are at age 40 in this industry, wether I should self fund to frozen ATPL, or just keep my sights lower. I am in a position to start my PPL next year and am looking to go as far as instrument rating and night qualification. Even if it just stays as a hobby for the next 7 years. As I say, any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[taxistaxing]

I am in a position to start my PPL next year and am looking to go as far as instrument rating and night qualification.


Do you mean CPL?

Typical order for a modular training programme would be:
- PPL
- Hour building/ATPL ground school (including 5 hours night flying and 300nm CPL qualifier)
- CPL
- ME rating
- MEIR
- MCC

So you'd typically do the CPL before the MEIR.

[Luke SkyToddler]

It's not impossible to get employed at age 40+ but you need to do a very very serious cost benefit analysis as to whether it's worth it - no decent outfits are hiring and you don't have time on your side so it's a very high probability that if you gain employment at all, it will be a scummy "flexi crew" type contract that might pay £1500 a month in the summer and nothing in the winter.

Trying to repay a £100K loan is all but impossible on that kind of contract even for the young 'uns that can still sponge off mum and dad. If you have a family that depends on you or anything like that, then I can't find strong enough words to warn you off the whole idea.

[FANS]

Chris

The question is more around whether you can afford to do it. You'll know the salaries mentioned on these forums and it's for you to say whether you can afford to live (+ family if applicable) on that amount of pay + your pension, at a base that might not be home.

If you can, great; if not, then it can't work for you.

[captbod]

Hi Mate,
I was in the same situation as you having spent 18 years in the RAF Regiment (with no regrets i might add). I had previously tried to remuster to Pilot but was unsuccessful so I volunteered for redundancy and left the RAF in 1998. This now put me in a good financial position and I was able to fund most of my training from the settlement money, after of course taking care of the other important things in life e.g. buying a house. I completed my training (Modular/ self improver) in July 2001 (bad timing). I was however fortunate enough to secure employment with a small Turboprop freight operator in Aug 2002 and that bit of luck obviously led me to where i am now.
Unfortunately however I had a number of advantages then compared to someone who starts their training now:

1) It was a lot cheaper then.

2) The modular/ self improver route was still equally well regarded.

3) There were still a number of small turboprop outfits which were more willing to look at newbee's, older guy's/ girls, instructors, self improvers etc.

4) I was lucky.

5) P2F had not yet taken hold.

If you have 7 years left in the RAF then you should get started now whilst you're still in employment. The Flying schools on base are usually relatively cheap compared to civvy street and if you can get a lot of your hour building done coupled with your ATPL ground school who knows, you may be able to use your resettlement grant to pay for the CPL or IR. By taking this route you should be able to avoid taking on a large financial dept and if at some stage you decide it's not for you then you can jump ship without to much of a financial loss.

It was a gamble for me but it paid off, however things were a lot different then.

Good luck and make the most of your time left in the RAF.

[no sponsor]

These days it's a very young mans game. Who knows what the aviation landscape will be in 7 years time, but I suspect the expansion of LCC airlines in the UK and Europe will be long over. Time to command in those airlines will be similar to legacy airlines of today. Perhaps even the expansion of the Gulf states will be well and truly over too, again preventing people from moving from European LCCs to Emirates for a decent salary.

I read an interesting book by a financier who predicted the recession of 2008-2012. He got the ones right prior to that too. When do you think the next one is going to be? You guessed it 2019-2022!

Personally, I wouldn't recommend you do it. Its nice being in a legacy airline, but even our T&Cs are under erosion. I spent a few years in a LCC and I wouldn't recommend that either. Who knows what our T&Cs will be like in a few years, but one thing is for sure, they won't be getting better!

[magicmick]

Hi Buzzy367, good to hear that ex mil captbod managed to get lucky when he left, but as he has admitted that was a long time ago before P2F and before the current recession.
My experience as ex mil after 22 years service is a bit more recent, I left in Jan 2007, aged 40 after serving as an avionics engineer I was senior non commissioned with no pilot contacts in the aviation world. I did my PPL and night rating in Florida as resettlement and used commuted pay off to fund the hours building, theory study, CPL, MEP, MEIR and MCC while the pension paid the mortgage and my wife worked to keep some more money coming in. Like captbod I had classic bad timing in that I finished everything in May 2008, just as the recession was biting deep and airlines (XL for example) were either going bust or shutting the recruitment taps and laying pilots off.
Long story short, since then I’ve had one assessment day with Ryanair and a telephone interview for a bizjet job that I saw advertised in the career transition partnership rightjob website (you’ll get a user name and password for rightjob when you do your resettlement workshop) neither the Ryanair or bizjet opportunities resulted in a job offer.
At the end of 2008 I realised that I really needed to be earning some money to provide for my family so I was lucky enough to get hired as an engineering contractor working for an MoD project team. Though I find the work soul destroying at times, it’s well paid, the people that I work with are great and I’m at home with my family every night so I count myself as fairly fortunate. As a mil trained engineer you have a good Plan B to keep money coming in when you finish flying training but be prepared for Plan B to become Plan A if necessary.
I would echo captbods advice, get as much done as you can while you’re serving use ELC as much as possible to help pay for courses (many flight training schools and groundschools are ELC registered) and then use resettlement and pay off money to finish off your training.
In many ways I wish that I’d followed my own advice and trained as far as possible while I was still serving and I might have finished everything while recruitment was still reasonable but life’s too short to think about ‘what ifs’ and my decent engineering salary ensures that I keep my MEIR current while looking for flying work.
I suppose the biggest pieces of advice are don’t go into debt for training and don’t risk property secured against a loan, it’s a massive gamble and like any gamble you should never risk what you can’t afford to lose.
I genuinely wish you nothing but luck in your endeavours, if you think that I can answer any other questions that you have feel free to post them on this thread or PM them to me and remember your military experience will be well regarded in civvie street but no-one owes any of us a living.

[packo1848]

I can't comment on the job prospects with any authority, having not made it there yet (I'm about to sit my first set of ATPL exams), but following on from captbod's comment reference the on-base flying clubs, they would be a great place to start. I also served in the RAF Regiment, and have just left to concentrate on my studies, I did my PPL and am doing my hour building at Waddington. The cost per hour of a 4-seater is in the region of £100 per hour, brakes off - brakes on, or £125 with an instructor, and this is sometimes reduced should the club have enough excess money from any source. So whether you decide to continue to CPL/IR or remain with your PPL it will save you a fairly substantial amount of money! And of course theres the benefit that the majority (if not all of them) are ELCAS providers, and who can refuse a nice bit of cash from the MOD? :ok:

As for whether you should go for it, my father has accumulated something in the region of 14,000 hours now, and he still enjoys it, to the point where he not only flies for a living, but in his spare time as well. He has always said despite all the negativity out there, and the below average prospects at the moment, its never something he would discourage me from doing. Can't be that bad eh?

[Buzzy367]

Thanks guys for all the advice. It's as expected. I will start my ppl next year just as a hobby / hours building exercise and get as many qualifications as I can maintain and just see what happens. Who knows eh?! I'm certainly not planning to bankrupt myself. Luckily, wife is on a good steady wage, and pension, resettlement, ELC's and a kidney should cover the lion share of it. See you up there and thanks again.

[dreamliner_dreamer]

Buzzy, I like you am in a similar position. I have a PPL and am going to work my way through the modular route whilst still in the RAF. I intend to start ATPL ground school next year following a visit to the desert. Following that, a CPL/ME IR will hopefully be on the cards with resettlement money and savings. Although I can't really offer any advice as such, I would echo what people above have said. RAF Flying clubs will get you through the PPL, night and hours building stage in a "relatively" inexpensive way and the use of ELCs helps even more. There is a lot of negativity surrounding career change at a later age, but if it's what you really want to do and you can fund it without getting into major debt, then you should go for it. You'll never know unless you try.

[Andy_20]

Buzzy, check your PM's.

Ive come from same background and have just completed all training.