I disagree Rex. Very senior shorthaul commands cost them money. A senior LH FO costs less than a draft trip a month short of a middle ground SH skipper. When you compare the two, what you want are junior SH skippers. Quite a few of our P1s are paid (a lot) less than EZ and RYR. Some FOs (LH and SH) are even going back. Granted, not in big numbers but the fact they exist at all is significant.
Originally Posted by
Sygyzy
Wiggy,
I can confirm. When Colin Barnes was DFO he insisted on it. It became 'over my dead body Barnes', that people would move seats in LH and have to go shorthaul first.
In my case(1988) I went from RHS 747 to LHS 737 and then back to LHS 747 all within 6 months as nobody else wanted to move. Friends who went onto the shorthaul Tristar for their first command (how does THAT work) were back on the 747 having spent so little time on the Tristar that they had been unable to give sectors away due to insufficient command time.
After that huge waste of money the system fell into disrepute and first commands were on any type.
As an aside, at that time the (new) 744 fleet was having a hard time recruiting experienced F/O's as they'd be frozen for 5 years and therefore miss out on commands due to the back to shorthaul nonsense. A small number (6?) negotiated a guaranteed (in writing) right to left command if they would go on the 744 - and that's what they did. The system fell apart about a year later.
S
Fully understandable when it was 25 years to
any command. There are some in the past couple of years who gained shorthaul LHR commands after 18-24 months (admittedly with previous command experience) so that perhaps changes the options. While there is an anomaly every few years (remember 7576 commands when it was retiring the first time!!), it may become the standard career for most (RHS then LHS SH, RHS LH then LHS LH - the US way really) - at which point, expect it to be fair game for the company to chase as it won't p!ss that many people off and it's significant to the bottom line. Demographically, we're sitting close to that position now - everyone senior enough for a LH command who wants one has got one, leaving those guys not senior enough who are "hanging on" a bit vulnerable....