Originally Posted by
geardown1
Year one FO on around £32K basic, plus duty pay and sector pay. Time to command could be as fast as 2 or 3 years, depending on experience. BALPA just negotiated a 12% payrise and LM was the first airline to return to profitability (albeit small) after covid. Last few years been given a £750 bonus, first for working hard and most recent to cover the cost of living crisis. Better pay than Eastern. 3 year bond for the type rating, no payment due and full salary and accommodation provided for training.
Will work hard in summer, and less hard in winter but still busy. Expect a disruptive summer - as all airlines probably. But ATR's and ERJ's seem to have a fair share of tech issues, throw that in the mix of ground handling staff shortages and wheelchair delays and summer may be tedious.
Great management, and even better crew to work with.
If you can put up with a regional airline roster and don't expect a long haul life then it's good. If you expect too much, you'll not enjoy it. Best bit is you're usually left to it and get the job done with good colleagues.
Some use it as a stepping stone, and others been there for donkeys years. If you want to be based in ABZ and be home almost every night, it's a good enough gig. Of course, less pay than jet operators but it is what it is.
Thats great, thanks very much for the info. I heard yearly flying is roughly 500-600hrs, would that be a correct assumption?? I wanted to gauge how doable it might be for me to fly back home to Manchester every so often as they have 3 direct flights from Aberdeen (eg if I had 3 days off in a row then I could make that trip)
Cheers