To all in Ba Connect,
I know how you are feeling at the moment.
13 years ago I also found out, via the BBC, that Dan-Air had been sold to BA for one pound and that BA were laying off most of the Dan-Air pilots, offering them no more than statutory redundancy ! At the time I had a 2 year old and a 2 week old
to provide for and the house we were in negotiations to buy obviously could not be completed. Six months after that I joined FlyBe - they were the hardest 6 months of my life.
Do I hold any ill feeling toward BA crews ? Of course not - as for BA management, well that's different matter. We are all pawns in a big game - trying to make ends meet and pay the mortgage.
The only way I can help you at the moment is to try and answer some of your questions - to be perfectly honest none of us at FlyBe saw this one coming and I, too, only found out yesterday. There are many FlyBe pilots asking questions, which at this stage are not being answered.
FlyBe are not the best of companies but not the worst either. One of the most important things is it's constantly changing - yesterdays being the largest so far. The staff are all great to work with - you actually have fun when you go to work.
We do actually have a schedule agreement, it does offer some protection but to be honest it wouldn't be worth me giving you the details yet because we have been fighting to improve it, and our salaries, since April and there is a new one in the pipe line.
The Dash 8 is the fleet at the moment that needs pilots. There is a definite shortage of Dash Capt's - the starting salary for Capt's is around £45K, F/O's start at £27K.
The 146's are being replaced by the EMB195 as we speak, so as you can appreciate seats on the left seat of the 195 will be very slim as there is already a long waiting list and as for the right seat this too has a waiting list but not as long. Capt's start at £51K and F/O's about £31K. All these salaries are about to increase by approx. 5% or else !!
That's all I have time for at present but I will try and answer any further questions later today.
Good luck with whatever you decide in the future,
PJ2