Dear cygnet78,
I flew Cathay for 30 years. For three decades, I had a front row seat to a never ending stream of cost reduction measures that manifested themselves in two ways: constant cuts to pay and benefits, along with constant reductions to the standards of hiring and the training of pilots.
Pilot pay and benefits were constantly on the chopping block. It became a pattern of abuse. Every few years new contracts would be imposed in a sign or be fired campaign of intimidation. Inevitably, as the lower pay packages attracted fewer and fewer experienced pilots, recruitment quality standards were reduced. Bizarrely, managers boasted that the reduced standards still attracted top pilot talent….and so the cuts continued.
As well as the pay cuts, cost efficiencies were imposed on what used to be minimum training requirements, such as minimum crew experience levels and minimum crewing levels on long range and ultra long range flights. It was alarming to witness the constantly diminishing standard of pilot experience on the flight deck. Warnings to management were shrugged off.
Pilot’s flying rosters were also on the block and began to reflect an abusive interpretation of the required flight time limitations. By international convention, maximum flight time limitations are meant to be exercised only in the short term to deal with extreme and unforeseen circumstances (typhoon). Yet, in an effort to scrimp and save money, Cathay management began to roster pilots to the legal limit on a permanent basis. Every assigned flight pattern was stretched to the absolute legal limit. Rest patterns rostered between flights became the absolute bare minimum allowed by law. The outcome should have been predictable, unsustainable levels of pilot fatigue and burn out was the result.
Multiple warning letters from Senior Training Captains to management about these and other cost cutting safety concerns were ignored. The risks associated with diminishing safety standards were rubber stamped as acceptable safety risks by internal management review. All the while management would crow, without shame, that safety was their top priority (Orwellian).
The never ending spiral of cost cutting and poisonous intimidation succeeded in reducing what was once the best pilot job in the world…to a kafkaesque life of toxic intimidation, malaise and fatigue.
So after 30 years I had enough. I gave three months notice, packed up my family and left. A clerk oversaw my release and walked me to the door.
Cathay is indeed reaping what it has sowed.
Last edited by raven11; 10th Jan 2024 at 18:55.