Apologies Fluffy for the delay, just got back from a trip and am recovering.
Right, money for an FO on Europe base is £41748 plus a few extras, this is payed gross into a Hong Kong HSBC account
a branch of which is at Cathay City. Duty pay is about £200 a month payed with salary.Nightstops about £60 cash in hand at the hotels.
There is no pension as such with CX. There are two options. The first is where 15.5% of gross salary is payed with your salary every month
and you can spend that on drink, drugs, race horses or wotever you like. Some even suggest saving it for your retirement! The down side to this
is that if you are liable for UK tax this amount is taxed aswell. Second option is to forward this money into a HK 'fidelity' account of bonds, shares etc
which is payed gross together with any contributions from yourself. This is your retirement account and is payable to you when you leave CX and again you
can spend it on wotever you like. Most people do this.
Tax situation. HK take about 12% every year (not PAYE) if you spend more than 60 days a year in HK. As they count arrival and departure days most Freighter guys
have to pay this. If you are liable for UK tax then you pay the balance of your total tax to UK, ie. you don't pay full whack UK plus full whack HK. Alot of guys live abroad and so only pay HK tax. Very nice thank you.
I take home my 15.5% so average take gome pay for me year 3 is £4500 gross. Applicable tax to be deducted.
Roster patterns can vary greatly. Normally 7-8 day tours followed by 6-7 days off. Sometimes tours can be up to 12 ( never more) and rarely down to 4?
Days off between tours are between 5 and 10, normally 6 with a sby at the end. We fly Europe (Manchester, Frankfurt, Paris) to Dubai.To HK then either back to dubai and then home (5 day tour) or once in HK you could have days off or a return Penang, Japan, Singapore wotever. Roster disruption is a pain cos cargo can sit around on the ramp until the a/c becomes serviceable whereas pax. can't ( unless you are easyjet....)
Flying the classic is great, make you feel like a king but you have to work at it, if not it will trip you up and you look like a plonker. That happens alot to me..
Moral is not too bad considering. The guys are great and there are usually a dozen or so guys at each stop to drink with. Master caution on the F\Es they are dangerous with a beer in their hands. Usual whinge about the company trying to screw you, managers being ineffectual, lack of roster stability but the company prospects are good and the company is bloody stable making loadsacash so no more whinging than most other companies. Need a good sense of humour tho' to get thro' it all!
Very short of captains but most fo's want to do their time and goto mainline. Time for this these days is about 4 and a bit years. They will pay bypass ie mainline pay after 3.5 years from joining. I was able to apply for cargo command after being there only 2 years (but I will hang on for pax flee)t, some less. Command pay is £75000 plus bits and bobs mentioned above.
Staff travel is good. ID90 available on any oneworld airline and full interline tickets. No probs there atall.
Salary scales are below. Can't think of anything else, might need some more sleep. If you want anymore info or expansion of wot I've written don't hesitate.
JJB
Freighters
Captains FO
75300 41748
76825 42588
78360 43428
79920 44328
81516 46068
83147 47448
84804 48876
86496 50340